Melfie Pantonial | Kate Quinco | Ginalyn Regalado - B.A.

Political Science IV TTh 1:30-

3:00pm ASAB 345

Modern Forced labor

Of Filipino people
Forced Labor entails any work or service which people are forced to do against their
will, under threat of punishment. As per International Labor Organization (ILO), forced labor
refers to situations in which persons are coerced to work through the use of violence or
intimidation, or by more subtle means such as accumulated debt, retention of identity papers or
threats of denunciation to immigration authorities. Some forms of forced labor are slavery,
human trafficking, commercial sex exploitation, and labor exploitation.
Forced labor in countries in the Asia-Pacific region, including the Philippines, generated
the highest illegal profits according to the latest report of the International Labor Organization
(ILO).
Forced labor can occur in many forms. Contrary to popular belief, forced labor not only
occurs in the case of human trafficking, sex workers and child workers. It occurs wherever and
whenever work or service is exacted by people or employers who have the will and power to
threaten workers with severe deprivations, such as withholding food or wages, restricting their
workers movements or locking them up.
For instance, a domestic worker is in a forced labor situation if her boss forbids her to go
outside and threatens her, for instance, with non-payment of her salary in case of disobedience.
She may also work for an unbearably low wage, but that is exploitation if she were free to leave
work anytime.
Most victims are women and children.
The ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work obliges member
States to eliminate forced labor. A work relationship should be freely chosen and free from
threats.
Cases of Forced Labor
Labor Exploitation
The case reported by the Philippine Daily Inquirer where eight female workers died from
a fire because they were locked in the two-story house of their employer is a case of forced labor.
According to the Inquirer report, the women were trapped inside the padlocked room at
the second floor of the apartment in Pasay City, which was being used by their boss as a DVD
warehouse. They died of suffocation as the house was engulfed by fire past 12 midnight last
Friday. Their charred bodies were found piled inside the room. The victims were natives of
Dumaguete and Cagayan de Oro.
Their boss, Juanito Go, 68, a Chinese businessman, denied locking up the stay-in
workers, and said: Aksidente ito. Wala tayong magagawa doon. Babayaran naman sila ng
kumpanya.
 I wonder how much each life is worth to Go.
Go was placed under the custody of the Pasay City Police for investigation. The Inquirer
reported that Go and his son-in-law, Joey Cabrera, the property manager, face charges of
negligence resulting in multiple homicide and physical injuries, according to Chief Insp. Joey
Goforth of the Pasay City police.
The police should also refer this case to the Labor department because other charges can
be filed against Go, including forced labor, labor exploitation, even human trafficking, since
several of his workers are minors who were allegedly personally recruited by Go.
Go reportedly paid only P2,500 to P3,000 a month per employee and imposed 12-hour
work shifts on his all-female crew. His place of business was registered only as a residential area
and did not have a business permit.
Gos workers who survived the fire said they were all locked up in the house when the fire
struck. All the doors were locked, including the main gate. The windows were reinforced with
iron grills and the house had no fire exits.
Go would leave the place at the end of the day and order the gates to be locked from inside. The
workers would then throw the key over to Go. Returning the next day, Go would throw the key
back in so they could open the gates.
Economic circumstances can compel people to barter away their freedom, to put up with such
horrible working conditions like what Go imposed on his poor female workers, eight of whom
died in a fire that they could have easily escaped, if they were not locked in.
But the government must not allow this to happen. And it must prosecute businessmen like
Juanito Go to the fullest extent of the law.
May he rot in jail.
Forced Overtime
Article 83 of the Philippine Labor Code says "The normal working hours of an employee shall
not exceed eight hours a day." Article 87 of the same Code says "Work may be performed
beyond eight hours provided that the employees is paid for the overtime work, an additional
compensation equivalent to his regular wage plus at least 25% thereof"

The law is clear on compensation that employees must receive for overtime work, but there are
no limits on overtime hours. There is less concern on effects of long hours of forced overtime on
workers' health.
Forced overtime is the most common form of forced labor, but also the most unnoticeable to
public eye. This mostly happens in corporations especially controlled although not owned by
aliens, or foreigners residing in the Philippines and is managing their manufacturing companies.
Although they cannot own large amounts of property in the country, they can find a number of
ways to do so.
MEPZ and other manufacturing companies especially for export, can give you thousands of
employees still working or not anymore stories of extreme work overtime. Some even work for
more than 20 hours a day, receiving no additional income. They cannot fight back because
theyre afraid they might not be given any wage at all, or the worst, they might get fired.
Slavery

This is so common to OFWs or Overseas Filipino Workers. According to the 2016 Global
Slavery Index by global organization Walk Free Foundation, there were an estimated 401,000
Filipinos, or 0.40 percent of the population, living in modern slavery in 2015. The Philippines'
estimated population as of 2016 was 100,699,000.

The Philippines ranked 33rd among 167 countries with the largest estimated population enslaved
through forced labor, commercial sexual exploitation, child soldiery or pa-aling fishing, based on
the survey's prevalence index. Pa-aling fishing is a highly dangerous fishing technique involving
divers who use flimsy pipes to pump air attached to compressors.

The same study revealed that majority of the Filipinos living in slavery are in forced labor. It said
that an estimated 10 million Filipinos go abroad for work and many are subjected to human
trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor throughout Asia, Europe, North
America and the Middle East.

It said that the most recent survey on overseas Filipino workers by the Philippine Statistics
Authority suggests that one in every two Filipino women working abroad is unskilled and is
employed as a domestic worker, cleaner, or in the service sector.

"In 2015-2016, research has revealed that migrant worker exploitation occurs during all phases
of labor migration, with many prospective migrants having a lack of knowledge of the processes
and their rights resulting in an ease of exploitation," the study added.

About 47.67 percent of Filipinos are also said to be vulnerable to modern slavery, which could be
through mental physical threat or coercion at work, ownership or control by en "employer"
through mental or physical abuse, dehumanization or treatment as a commodity, or constraints
placed on freedom of movement.

While slavery is indeed avoidable, that was not the case in the viral personal essay "Lola" written
by the late Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist Alex Tizon. Lola's story touched many netizens as it
captured her life of being essentially enslaved from when she was 18 years old until she passed
away at the age of 86.

At the tender age of 18, Lola was assigned by Tizon's grandfather, an Army lieutenant named
Tomas Asuncion, to become their family's helper. She lived with them for 56 years, took care of
Tizon when he was an infant until he grew old, but the journalist said he only realized that Lola
was a slave when he was 11 years old.

Lola was not freed from unpaid forced labor and never got a chance to have a family of her own.
Accustomed to that life, she looked after Tizon until he grew up and had his own family.
Sex industry
Filipino workers are also vulnerable to forced labor and involuntary servitude in the sex industry
throughout Asia and the Middle East.
Of particular concern is the trafficking of women under the guise of marriage for the purpose of
commercial sexual exploitation.
The United Nations estimates that 100,000 children in the Philippines are trafficked into
commercial sexual exploitation each year, with many cases linked to organized crime groups.
Filipino men are also subject to forced labor abroad, with many working in the construction
industry, seafaring and maritime work, agriculture and manufacturing.
In 2013, young Filipino boxers were allegedly trafficked into Australia on sporting visas, where
they were held in a debt bondage situation and forced to work in unpaid domestic labor.

Despite tensions easing in the Mindanao region following a peace deal agreement between the
Philippine government and the Muslim separatist group Moro Islamic Liberation Front in May
2014, South Mindanao remains volatile.

Child warriors

Emerging factional conflict among breakaway gangs, Islamic militants and feuding clans
threaten the newly established peace and present a risk for children being recruited in armed
political groups.

Children are reportedly used by the Armed Forces of the Philippines as guides and informants,
and are engaged in actual armed conflict in insurgent groups like the New Peoples Army, Abu
Sayyaf and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters.

Forced and child labor exists in the agricultural sector within the Philippines, including in
tobacco fields, banana plantations and sugarcane crops. Children living in tobacco-growing
regions often work alongside their families to harvest and package tobacco leaves for export.

Children as young as 12 years old were identified in the sector, with many working more than 43
hours per week, exposing them to dangerous levels of nicotine and other hazardous farming
chemicals.

Pa-Aling fishermen are subject to forced labor and exploitation at sea. The Pa-Aling fisherman
face similar conditions to fisherman in Thailand and Malaysia, but these fishermen dive deep
into the ocean with nothing but compressors in order to scare fish out of coral reef.

They are often forced into these situations and lack legal protection.

Causes of Forced Labor

Unemployment in the Philippines is attributed to reasons including overpopulation, oversupply
of labour force on certain industries and the inability to take on available jobs.
Poverty
 Poverty and ultimately lack of necessary skills to land a decent job is also a reason why
Filipinos are forced to enter into unfair labor contracts. This is the only way they can survive, to
feed off of extreme labor conditions.
Overpopulation

Philippines has a high population growth rate at an average of 1.7% for the past few years,
consistently higher than the world's population growth rate at an average of 1.2%. The high
population growth rate which translates to a steady supply of graduates outstrips the rate at
which jobs are created, leaving these graduates finding themselves unemployed.
Oversupply of labour force and inability to take on available jobs (structural
unemployment)

Undergraduates are still taking up college courses that are popular but were previously high in
demand. After graduation, these graduates possess skills that are not high in demand in the job
market. As such, there is a skill mismatch. For example, in the healthcare industry, nurses were
previously in demand abroad. Many undergraduates took up nursing and soon supply matches
demand. However, the country's education system continues to produce college graduates who
have taken up nursing. As supply increases above demand, there is an oversupply of
labour (Figure 3). As a result, these graduates are unemployed.

How to Cure Forced Labor Issue

Government Intervention (esp for Filipinos working overseas)
Strict and Strong Labor Laws Implementation in the Philippines