Christmas comes early for Davao government employees with up P15T bonus guaranteed

Employees of the Davao City government will have more reasons to smile these days after they were assured of their Christmas bonus.

The Davao City government has assured the employees of the early release this November of the remaining portions of their 13th month pay, half of which was already released last June.

“We will start to release the 13th month pay of the local government employees by November,” Assistant City Administrator/Human Resource Management Office Department head Edwin Alparaque said yesterday.

Alparaque also assured the employees that they will be given their Social Amelioration Bonus amounting to P15,000 for regular employees and P10,000 for contractual employees and job orders.

“These benefits are already part of the 2012 annual appropriation so I do not see any reason why they won’t receive these benefits this year,” he said.

The same Social Amelioration Pay has been previously given to the employees last year, he added.

However, Alparaque clarified that this is not yet the signing bonus as both management and labor are still negotiating the Collective Negotiation Agreement (CNA). The signing bonus, he added, is given the employees whenever a new CNA has been negotiated and approved.

“Ginatuki pa man ang bag’ong CNA so wala pa’y signing bonus (we are still negotiating the new CNA so there is as yet no signing bonus),” he said

USWAG-Bubai In SM City Davao's Xmas Decor Demo

These accessories are made of scrap paper and cigarette boxes. They are selling from P35 to P250 for matching necklace, bracelet and earrings.

USWAG-Bubai, a Toril-based women's cooperative that popularized jewelry-accessories using scrap paper, will spearhead SM City Davao's Techno Transfer Demo this November. The Christmas Decor Demo is part of this month's Recycling Market Fair at SM City.

The members of Uswag Bubai have been trained in creating useful materials including necklaces, bracelets, earrings, rosaries and even Christmas decorations using recyclable waste materials. Their works of art were featured during the recent Davao Trade Expo held at the Davao Convention Center last month.

The workshop, which is a partnership between SM City Davao and the Davao City Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Inc. aims to encourage enterprising Dabawenyos to come up with creative Christmas decorations out of waste materials like used papers and plastics.