Electronics multinational NXP is coming under increasing pressure to reinstate the 24 union members it sacked three months ago in Cabuyao, Philippines. NXP’s corporate strategy in response to the pressure has been to repeatedly delay any intervention to wear down the MWAP union. Watch a moving video depicting NXP’s violations and its effects on the sacked workers, who cannot afford their children’s school fee anymore.
Electronics multinational NXP is coming under increasing pressure to reinstate the 24 union members it sacked three months ago in Cabuyao, Philippines. NXP’s corporate strategy in response to the pressure has been to repeatedly delay any intervention to wear down the MWAP union. Watch a moving video depicting NXP’s violations and its effects on the sacked workers, who cannot afford their children’s school fee anymore.
In defending and maintaining its gross violation of human rights, NXP’s argument is that the 5 May sacking of the entire elected leadership of the NXPSCIWU union was justified because union members did not work on three public holidays in April 2014.
The claim that this failure to work on national public holidays amounted to an illegal strike and sackable offence is both immoral and wrong. The labour authorities of the Philippine government are brokering conciliation talks between the union and local management. However NXP remains intransigent against the reinstatement of the sacked 24, offering instead a payoff that was unanimously rejected by workers.
Watch the moving video overview of NXP’s violation in the Philippines and its effects on the sacked workers. During the interviews, the sacked workers explain that NXP’s vindictive mass sacking forced them to take their children out of school, as they can no longer afford it.
IndustriALL Global Union general secretary Jyrki Raina stated: “How can the executives of NXP and their customers such as Apple sleep at night knowing the facts of this case?”
Apple’s iPhone 6 and many other everyday electrical items have important microchip technology built by this abusive employer NXP. It is the duty of those corporate customers to force the misbehaviour of NXP to stop, with an immediate first step being the reinstatement of the 24 sacked trade union representatives.
The union busting attack by NXP was launched in retaliation to the union’s bargaining unit, led by President Reden Alcantara, negotiating for a daily pay increase of US$1.39 and the regularization of 1,500 contract workers. The 8% pay increase sought by the union would be enough to buy a kilo of rice and a pack of dried fish.
As well as Apple, two other top NXP customers Ericsson and Nokia are looking into the situation at their supplier, following an alert by IndustriALL affiliates in Sweden and Finland.
On 6 August NXP workers marked the third month of their campaign to “Bring Back the 24” with a 1,000-strong march inside the special economic zone, LISP1, where NXP is located. Other trade unions and community supporters joined the workers’ caravan from capital Manila to Southern Tagalog. Large steel barricades designed to block the march were pushed out the way. When marching past the NXP facility, workers inside showed their support with raised fists from inside the windows.
Reacting to the constant firm support for the union by remaining NXP workers, management has now installed cameras throughout the inside of the plant, and instructed internal security guards to prevent workers from wearing “Reinstate the 25 Officer” t-shirts and from posting support messages on social media.
NXP’s management continues to escalate its violations of the rights of its employees and make a mockery of the corporate claims that: “NXP is a reputable company that respects the rights of its workers. We have always enjoyed a strong and mutually beneficial partnership with our local employees and look forward to reaching a fair agreement with them soon.”
Source: IndustriALL
- Follow the #BringBackNXP24 hashtag and Facebook page for full information
- See attached a PowerPoint file portraying each of the sacked 24
- Sign the SumOfUs online campaign with almost 150,000 supporters calling on Apple to get its supplier to do the right thing: http://bit.ly/1rz6y4G
