P5,000 monthly pay for BARMM domestic workers set

COTABATO CITY — The Bangsamoro Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board on Monday approved a wage order setting the monthly pay of domestic workers in the autonomous region to P5,000.

The Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao covers the provinces of Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, Lanao del Sur, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi and the cities of Lamitan, Marawi and Cotabato.

Members of the Bangsamoro Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board, Regional Labor Minister Muslimin Sema, workers’ sector representatives Norlyn Odin and Jonathan Acosta, Anwar Malang and Haron Bandila, who are both from the employers’ sector, Bangsamoro Planning Director Mohajirin Ali, and Regional Trade Investments and Tourism Minister Abuamri Tadik, signed the new wage order on Monday during a simple rite at the BARMM capitol in Cotabato City.

“It is a product of very extensive multi-sector consultations in the Bangsamoro provinces and cities. We saw to it that the wage order shall be acceptable to employers of domestic workers whom we call 'kasambahay' in the Filipino language,” Sema told reporters on Tuesday.

Malang, a lawyer who provides free legal advisory services to Moro labor groups, said the P5,000 monthly wage order they have just set is higher by P500 compared to the monthly salary of domestic workers in nearby cities and provinces in Region 12 as ordered recently by the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board-12.

Sema said he has directed the personnel of the provincial offices of the Ministry of Labor and Employment-BARMM to disseminate to the public the intricacies of the wage order setting a P5,000 monthly pay for domestic workers in the autonomous region.