Citing the struggles of education workers amid the pandemic, a federation of teachers on Wednesday, Feb. 10, reiterated its call for the release of the 2019 Performance Based Bonus (PBB).
The Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) urged the AO25 Inter-Agency Task Force (AO25 IATF), the body responsible for the approval of PBB of government employees, to “grant the immediate release” of PBB 2019 to all teaching and non-teaching personnel of the Department of Education’s (DepEd).
As prices of basic commodities coupled with expenses for distance learning, ACT Secretary General Raymond Basilio said that “our education workers have practically nothing left.”
Citing the need to urgently address “palpable health, economic threats and effects of the COVID-19,” that have affected thousands of public school teachers and non-teaching personnel nationwide, ACT said that the PBB 2019 should be released as soon as possible.
In a letter sent AO25 IATF, ACT appealed on “humanitarian grounds” the need for immediate relief to all teaching and non-teaching personnel who have acted well-beyond their duty to ensure education continuity amid the pandemic.
ACT said that many education workers - regardless of low salaries, meager benefits and lack of genuinely free health care services - have “diligently and punctually complied with all the requirements despite being burdensome.”
Basilio said that the PBB is supposed to be an incentive for outstanding performance in civil service for delivering on their duties and responsibilities. Basilio asserted that DepEd employees have “more than delivered their duties as they practically filled in the shortcomings of the government" in the implementation of the distance learning.
“On top of the numerous duties of our teachers, they diligently met the voluminous documentary requirements to qualify for this benefit as their meager salaries simply could not sustain their basic need,” Basilio said. “It is the height of insensitivity of those concerned to be slacking in their duty to process the PBB on time,” he added.
Basilio noted that the delayed release of PBB for DepEd employees has become a "perennial problem" in the last three years as the education workers have always been the last of the civil servants to receive the bonus.
“Now, where is the moral ascendancy of these offices who evaluate our performance when they themselves perform poorly on their duties?” he ended.