Let’s make the call for a national living wage of P1,200 a day a central election issue, militant groups in Negros Occidental urged as the nation marked Labor Day on Thursday, May 1.
Kilusang Mayo Uno-Negros and Makabayan-Negros, in a press statement, called on the public to place wages and livelihoods at the center of the national conversation because farmers and the poor continue to be left behind.
Prices of goods, services, and taxes continue to rise, while workers’ incomes remain low and inadequate, they said.
IBON Foundation states that the family living wage for a family of five is P1,200 per day, which is far from the current minimum wage in the region of only P440 to P480, the two groups said.
In Negros, the situation is even more dire. Among farmworkers and sugarcane laborers, daily earnings can be as low as P200, despite their backbreaking work, the KMU and Makabayan statement said.
“Instead of addressing the crisis, (President Ferdinand) Marcos Jr. is preoccupied with spectacle and political theatrics. He is once again peddling his old promise of P20 per kilo of rice, a false pledge from 2022 that is now being recycled for electoral gain. This is no real solution,” they said.
What is needed is the repeal of the Rice Liberalization Law, an anti-farmer measure that destroyed local production and drove farmers into deeper poverty, they said.
At the same time, the rising costs of essential services like water, electricity, and hospital care due to privatization show the government’s failure to ensure affordable social services, they added.
Bayan Muna and the broader Makabayan bloc said they have long demanded the removal of excise taxes on oil and basic goods to provide immediate relief to the people.
“This is not just about raising wages. This is about securing real, lasting change,” they said,
They also called for national industrialization and genuine land reform. *