Are the GSIS and SSS anti-labor?

When will the workers in this country find their resurrection, their Easter, if at all? The government seems to be too loud in words but too short in deeds. No less than the Supreme Court has found the GSIS and the SSS, as well as the Employees Compensation Commission, somewhat uncaring and apparently neglectful of their primary mission to implement the social justice clause of the Philippine Constitution. In a case that somehow illustrates these government agencies’ impervious stance to the painful struggles of the working class, the High Court, albeit in very diplomatic language, in effect, reprimanded these government corporations’ anti-labor attitude, in deciding claims for death benefits. Last February 6, Justice Arturo D. Brion, writing for the Second Division of the Supreme Court, affirmed the Court of Appeals’ ruling, which reversed both the GSIS and the ECC, in the case of GSIS vs. MARILOU ALCARAZ, (GR 187474). 

A poor widow, Marilou, was pleading with GSIS to grant and release the death benefits arising from the death of her husband Bernardo who died in 2005 inside the premises of MMDA in Makati after working for almost 29 years as laborer and metro-aide. In the comforts of their air-conditioned offices, it was very easy for these bureaucrats in government to deny the claim of the poor widow, on the shallow justification that Bernardo was also sick of diabetes and such ailment is not compensable under the listing which the ECC itself made. It is good that despite their poverty, Marilou fought for justice from 2005 when her husband died, until 2013 when justice was finally delivered by the Supreme Court. Of course, the actual release of the claims can still be delayed if the top notch lawyers of GSIS and ECC can find some lame excuses, in legalistic gobbledygook, to further exacerbate the suffering of the family.

The words of the Supreme Court, in the penultimate paragraph of the decision should be deemed a slap on the face of these well-paid officials in the GSIS, and also the SSS, and the ECC: “ We take this occasion to reiterate that, as an agency charged by law with the implementation of social justice, guaranteed and secured by the Constitution, the ECC, as well as the GSIS and the SSS should adopt a liberal attitude in favor of the employees, in deciding claims for compensability, especially where there is some basis in the facts for inferring a work-connection to the incident or illness.

Why do the GSIS and the ECC need the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals to remind them of their sworn duties? And since there are labor representatives sitting in the Board of these agencies, with fat allowances and bonuses, why are these so-called workers’ representatives mysteriously silent in the midst of this blatant denial of the workers’ rights? Why are these agencies too overzealous in guarding the billions of money in the State Insurance Fund, when in fact, these are not coming from the government coffers. They are deposited by the employers on a monthly basis precisely to pay for death, disability and disease-related benefits. The GSIS used to buy paintings in millions of dollars using the peoples’ money? Why deny a widow of her rightful benefits? The GSIS, SSS and ECC officials enjoy handsome benefits and perks. They have never experienced cleaning the streets of Makati for 29 years.

How many claims coming from the poor were denied by the GSIS and the SSS and which were also affirmed preemtorily by the ECC? When I was sitting as a designated Chairman of ECC from 2002 to 2005, I used to plead before the other members of the Board to stop denying claims in the mere pretext of saving the money of the State Insurance Fund. I was told that the GSIS makes investments in giant corporations like San Miguel and Meralco. I was also told that the SSS used to condone or write-off loans in multi-millions because of inability to collect from rich borrowers. If these were true, why is there a propensity to deny claims from poor workers and their widows, widowers and orphans? I do not wish to judge these agencies on the basis of one case. But there is already a pattern that is indicative of an anti-labor orientation. We should all stand up to make sure that the GSIS, the SSS and the ECC should perform their own sworn duties. If we don’t, then we are all doomed.