By JOSEPH G. LARIOSA

(Journal Group Link International)

C HICAGO, Illinois (JGLi) – Seven of the 31 Sentosa nurses in New York were awarded “unexpired portion of their basic salaries” totaling $186,000 after they were “constructively dismissed” from their jobs while the claims of 18 others were dismissed for failing to produce a “quantum of evidence.”

A decision by a three-man panel headed by presiding commissioner Gerardo C. Nograles of the Philippine National Labor Relation Commission in Quezon City that was handed down last Sept. 25 but made public Tuesday (Oct. 13)  modified the earlier ruling of the Executive Labor Arbiter Fatima Jambato-Franco that dismissed the case last Jan. 24, 2008.

Despite the modest victory, Rico Foz, executive vice president of the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON), declared the ruling as a “victory for the nurses, as the decision now finds wrongdoing on the part of the Sentosa employers. It even orders Sentosa to pay the nurses. But let us not lower down our guard. Justice has not been truly served yet by this decision. While it is an improvement on how Philippine labor agencies look at the nurses’ complaints, the decision merely throws bones to the nurses and to all of us who support the nurses.

“We will not stop our crusade until true justice is given to the nurses, and until the perpetrators of illegal recruitment activities and human trafficking are brought to the court of law. The meat of the nurses’ complaints – the substantive issues of these cases – as not properly addressed by the NLRC to the satisfaction of the nurses.”

NAFCON is one of the lead convenors of the US-based Justice for Sentosa 27++Campaign.

In finding for the nurses – Maria Theresa Ramos, Jennifer Lampa, Carlo Conrad Garcia, Rizza P. Maulion, Riche P. Salve, Annabelle Capulong and Maria Consuelo Gonzales – the panel said instead of acting to their complaints, the respondents “threatened to file suits against them before the U.S. Courts.”

The nurses had earlier requested for legal assistance from the Philippine Consulate relative to their “working conditions, difficult working relationship with administration, delayed/underpayment payment of salaries and other benefits” that deprived them to send “money to their dependents in the Philippines” and their piling bills.

The panel said, “The delayed salaries and diminution in pay, coupled with the uncaring and indifferent attitude on the part of the respondents, brought about the feeling of oppression and created on adverse working environment, making it unacceptable for the employees to continue working for respondents.”

In this instance, “we find that the resignation of some employees was in reality not a choice but a situation created by respondents, thus, their severance form employment amounted to constructive dismissal.”
Because the respondents led by Sentosa Recruitment Agency were in “substantial breach in their employment contracts” as the employees “demands for money claims were duly substantiated,” the employees are “entitled to the full reimbursement of his placement fee with interest, plus the salaries corresponding to the unexpired portion” of their contract or for “three months for every year of the unexpired term, whichever is less,” citing “The Migrant Workers and Overseas Filipinos Act of 1995.”

There was no moral and exemplary damages awarded because the employees were not dismissed based on “bad faith or fraud or constituted an act of oppressive labor or was done in a manner contrary to morals, good customs or public policy.”

The employees were awarded 10% of total monetary award for attorney’s fees.

The nurses were earlier accused by their employers of abandoning their jobs and endangering their patients. (lariosa_jos@sbcglobal.net) # # #