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PUBLISHED: ‘Note Verbale‘, Manila Times (Sunday-Career Section) – 1 May 2005 Issue

It is ironic that Labor Day celebrations have become the vehicle to highlight the oppressive and inhumane condition of the working class in the country, and anywhere in the world. 

Peter McGuire, the apparent “Father of Labor Day”, began working at age 11 in the streets of New York City sometime in 1863 to help support his family. In those days, many children had to do factory work for low pay 10 to 12 hours a day, even when they were sick and exhausted physically. From that experience, an adult McGuire staged strikes and mounted mass actions to call attention to, and protect, the rights of workers. For his ‘adventurism’, McGuire became known as “disturber of the public peace”.  His mass-led actions culminated in the first Labor Day parade in New York City on September 5, 1882, which US Congress later recognized as a federal holiday.

Even May 1, acknowledged as Labor Day by many countries, was conceived out of a violent labor protest in Haymarket Square in Chicago in 1886, resulting in the death and injury of workers and policemen. This event led the World Workers Central Organization during its 2nd Congress in Paris, France, to declare and commemorate May 1 as Labor Day in 1889.

The Philippines marks Labor Day with the traditional activities, promises and rhetoric assuring a better condition for Filipino workers. Enigmatically, many labor issues that confront McGuire centuries ago have persisted to the present time. Perhaps, this is because labor is always outsmarted by capital in its interface with production. This leaves the government to act as a fulcrum to strike a balance between the many conflicting interests of labor and capital. The government is expected to play an unenviable role in breaking the impasse between these sectors. Government apathy in this regard has led to poverty, hunger, economic collapse, breakdown of peace and order, bloodshed, or even uprising and revolution.

The labor situation in the country demands greater challenges for the government.  In a research prepared by the Commission on Filipinos Overseas, there are at least 7.7 million Filipinos abroad as of December 2003, most of them working for foreign employers.  This influx of Filipino workers abroad puts a pressure on the government to protect their interest to the hilt. If it is difficult enough to harmonize the interest of labor and capital within the country, how much more between our Filipino workers overseas and their employers in a foreign country?  The problem becomes more complicated if we take into account the differences in migration, labor, and socio-economic policies between a foreign state and our country. And this is further complicated by discrimination, prostitution, illegal migration and recruitment, exploitation, corruption, complacency of some diplomatic and consular officials, and indifference, plain and simple.

Given the enormity of the perennial concerns of the Filipino workers, here and abroad, is there any reason to call for a celebration? Or perhaps, it may be more fitting to view May 1, Labor Day, as a commemoration of the continuing struggle of the working class that would seem endless in the course of time.