TACLOBAN CITY- City Mayor Cristina Gonzales Romualdez expressed her total support on the campaign of the Office of the Ombudsman to act on cases of sexual harassment against members of the government’s bureaucrats. Romualdez made her assurance as the Office of the Ombudsman launched on Tuesday (July 19) its gender information desk (GID). The gender information desk will now allow alleged victims of sexual harassment or discrimination to file their complaints. Romualdez narrated that her administration is also providing support to victims of sexual harassment involving women and children. The city mayor said that the Women Shelter, the name of the facility, does not offer temporary haven and protection to distress women and children but at the same time provides them courses of livelihood for them to earn. Jennifer Manalili, assistant ombudsman and chairperson on gender development, said that that it is very important to have a GID here in Tacloban because studies have shown that after supertyphoon “Yolanda,” people have been affected and there a lot of economic and social dislocation going on.

The GID aims to ventilate the complaints of the victims with the Ombudsman referring them to the proper authorities if they need psychological counseling. On the other hand, they can act immediately on the complaint if the complaint is against a public official or employee Cases of sexual harassment, particularly involving women, was noted to have increase after the region was pummeled by supertyphoon “Yolanda” in 2013. As reported by the Philippine National Police, cases of violence against women (VAW) have been increasing in the last six years or from 2010 to 2015. A total of 1,466 VAW cases were reported in January to October 2015 which was higher compare to only 60 cases in 2010. The increase in the number of reported VAW cases can be attributed to the massive campaign and implementation of the country’s laws on violence against women and the improved reporting system on VAW in the region.
(LIZBETH ANN A. ABELLA)

TACLOBAN CITY – Leyte Vice Governor Carlo Loreto lauds a bill filed by Senator Francis Pangilinan that would automatically grant civil service eligibility and, thus, regular employment to government workers who have rendered at least five years of continuous and efficient service. Loreto said it is a “good and sound bill” as there are more than 50% casual and contractual employees being employed by the government. He added that casual and contractual employees should also enjoy the benefits of regular employees such as security of tenure, social security and Pag-ibig Funds incentives, among others.

“The bill makes sense. For the reason that they are contractual and casual and subject to renewal for a period of time makes them work more efficiently so they can be rehired. That is why I say they should be entitled to the same benefits,” Loreto said. As for the province of Leyte, Loreto said, should the bill becomes a full law, putting in additional budget for more regular employees complete with benefits can be worked out. “It can be done. For the Sangguniang Panlalawigan alone, counting all casual and contractual employees would cost P30 million more in budget for personnel,” Loreto disclosed.

Pangilinan’s Civil Service Eligibility Bill acknowledges the long years of experience in the service of contractual and casual employees are enough to merit them regularization. The government is the biggest employer of the country, with some 1.4 million civil servants. However, almost three of four non-career workers hold casual or contractual positions. The measure would also make good on the promise of President Rodrigo Duterte to end contractualization. (AHLETTE C. REYES)

TACLOBAN CITY- A gender information desk was launched by the regional office of the Office of the Ombudsman where complaints on sexual harassment against a government official or personnel could be lodged. Jennifer Manalili, assistant ombudsman and gender development officer, said that the gender information desk will accept complaint not just from women victims but even from men who claimed to have been sexually harassed or discriminated. The gender information desk, located at the regional office of the Ombudsman, was launched on Monday (July 18). “Gender is not only about women but for all of us. Many (sexual and discrimination) incidents are happening but if it’s not reported or if they don’t have a venue to report it, we will not know it,” Manalili said. “This is our way of telling them to come out and tell us what is really going on, if there are really cases of harassment against women, children and men,” said Manalili. According to Manalili, with men encouraged to file their own sexual or discrimination complaints, this will erase the perception that only women are prone to be victimized of sexual or discrimination harassment. “But we will still need to access it if this will fall into our jurisdiction. If it falls under our jurisdiction, then we will take action on it but if they want other interventions to their complaints, then we will look at ways of how we can help them,” she stressed. Since the desk was launched, the regional ombudsman office has yet to receive any complaint. Manalili said that with the launching of gender information desk, it would now be easy to know the number of cases involving sexual or discrimination complainants perpetrated by government personnel or officials. (ROEL T. AMAZONA)