On Charter Day: City Hall workers may get P25K bonus

CEBU, Philippines — An initial amount of P25,000 as Charter Day bonus for Cebu City Hall employees has been pushed by Vice Mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia.

Lawyer Jerone Castillo, chairman of the Local Finance Committee, disclosed this yesterday during the flag raising ceremony at the City Hall grounds.

Castillo said they have considered the amount subject to the availability of funds. He said they are thoroughly looking at the savings of the city government to assess if there is enough to provide not just for the regular and casual employees of the city government but for the job order workers as well.

“Then we are requesting the Sangguniang Panlungsod na paspasan lang ni ang ordinance to cover the JO kay supposed to be last year pa ni, wa pa nila nahimo, mao ng kita magtinabangay,” said Castillo.

Earlier, Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama and the members of LFC agreed to let the City Council set the amount for the Charter Day bonus to avoid a repeat of what happened in December wherein the City Council refused to grant the P35,000 Christmas bonus that the mayor announced to the employees.

Castillo explained that the P25,000 suggested by the vice mayor will still be subject to the approval of the City Council.

“But this has to be formalized, through the necessary action of the Sanggunian and of course the local finance, amo ra ng recommendation and of course subject to the availability of the cash that we have... with this we can hopefully give the amount to all of you,” said Castillo.

Rama also reiterated to the employees during yesterday’s flag ceremony that he no longer wants to disclose the amount of bonus the city would give on Charter Day.

"I have enough of hurts," Rama said, referring to the slashed Christmas bonus he had promised to the employees.

“The LFC will be (the) one to say how much bonus they could give,” he added. — (FREEMAN)