San Agustin union rules out negotiations

By Ronilo L. Pamonag

There's no stopping the University of San Agustin Employees Union from holding a strike anytime next week, as they ruled out negotiations with the school administration.

“There will be no more negotiations because he doesn't want to negotiate with us,” USAEU president Theodore Neil Lasola said over the weekend, referring to university president Fr. Manuel Vergara.

He will never negotiate with us; ever since he has never wanted to negotiate with us, Lasola added, expressing their skepticism of Vergara entering into a compromise to prevent the impending work stoppage.

“We asked him to talk this over, to settle the controversy, but all he told us was that we are already bound by legalities,” Lasola said, recalling their earlier proposal for an out of court settlement which Vergara refused.

The looming strike comes in the wake of the termination of the union officers earlier, which was denounced as ‘union busting.'

The university justified the termination, saying that the Court of Appeals has ruled that the strike which the Union conducted last 2003 was illegal, and that it can now dismiss the officers behind the one-day work stoppage.

During Friday last week's strike voting, 231 of the 254 members who cast their votes are in favor of a strike.

“The (number of) yes votes is much more than the simple majority required by law even if many were not able to attend and cast their votes as it is summer or were on duty,” Lasola said in a text message.

Under the law, a union can go on a strike only after the lapse of seven days from the day of the strike vote.

Lasola said that they could go on strike anytime starting April 17, though he declined to divulge the exact date.