By Benjo Basas, Teachers’ Dignity Coalition national chairman
(Basas, in a letter to Comelec Chairman George Garcia, commended the agency for the successful conduct of BSKE 2023, which, according to the group, was generally peaceful and orderly despite some isolated reports of untoward incidents. Also, the group wanted to reiterate the calls to exempt from tax the election duty pay, a move that was approved by Congress last year but vetoed by President Marcos. Lastly, citing the delays in some of the tasks that resulted in a straight 30 hours of sleepless and continuous work for some teachers, the group demanded overtime or additional pay. Below are the contents of the TDC letter to Comelec.)
The Teachers’ Dignity Coalition (TDC) wishes to commend your office for leading the successful conduct of the recent Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections (BSKE) 2023. We concur with the Commission, and based on our own monitoring, the elections were generally peaceful despite some reported untoward incidents, which can be considered isolated. Overall, teachers now feel lower tension and increased security in their respective polling places and precincts. We attribute this to the consistent reminders, actions taken, and active engagement of Comelec (Commission on Elections) officials, particularly the chairperson.
However, matters related to taxes and additional pay were among the top concerns of our public school teachers. In light of this, we would like to get the Commission’s support or endorsement for the following requests:
1. Reiteration of the exemption of the election duty honoraria and allowances from 20 percent tax.
Our teachers consider the task a patriotic duty, but a good compensation package will help persuade more qualified teachers to sit as members of the Electoral Board (EB), the top priority under the Election Service Reform Act (Republic Act 10756). And while we acknowledge the increase in honoraria to P10,000 for the EB chairman and P9,000 for the members, the 20 percent tax will reduce the actual amounts to P8,000 and P7,200, respectively. The supposed pay hike granted by the government to our teachers was also immediately taken in the form of tax. We are aware that the Comelec does not have authority over tax exemptions; therefore, we will continue to lobby for this in Congress and hope that the President will not veto it this time.
2. Provide the funding requirement for the overtime pay.
Previously, the honoraria for members of the EB were stated as per diem and computed based on three days or 24 hours of continuous work (as BEI, or board of election inspectors, or BET, or board of election tellers, particularly in manual elections). Still, many of our DepEd (Department of Education) employees work beyond 24 hours and are thus entitled to overtime pay. In previous elections, the Comelec has granted the same request. Even in the 2022 NLE (National and Local Elections), the Comelec allocated overtime pay due to delays. This is also consistent with the policy of additional compensation for EBs assigned to precincts conducting a pilot test of early voting for the vulnerable sectors.
Specifically, we would like to request for a Comelec resolution or any sort of official document endorsing the same to the respective agencies.
Thank you very much!
