Friday, February 18, 2022
Pasig pushes 'mega dialysis center' opening to 2nd quarter of 2022
Katrina Domingo, ABS-CBN News
Pasig's mega dialysis center will not be operational until the second half of 2022, Mayor Vico Sotto said Friday, about 7 months after he first announced that one of the Philippines' largest dialysis centers would be opened by the end of 2021.
The local government needs to abide by several policies such as the publication of several documents in newspapers since it would be established under a public-private partnership scheme, Sotto told ABS-CBN News.
"We want to do things legally," he said.
"We want to do things correctly so lahat nakakasa na 'yan pati 'yung construction nung building (everything is in place including the building's construction)," he said.
In an interview in July 2021, Sotto said that the "building is finished" and the local government is "just fixing the sewage treatment plant and the drainage."
“By December, mabuksan na kahit na initial machines lang muna,” he said hours before delivering his 2021 State of the City Address.
(By December, we can open it with initial machines.)
Sotto said they "expected that everything with the building and the agreement is okay" but later on found that more technicalities had to be met.
"In principle, the agreement is already good," he said.
"In reality, ready na naman 'yung private partner pero when we studied the legalities, kailangan pa pala may publication sa dyaryo, kailangan aantayin mong may magka-counter offer," he said.
(In reality, the private partner is already ready but when we studied the legalities, there needs to be a newspaper publication and we have to wait for a counter offer.)
Sotto's push to integrate patients’ records in some 40 health centers in the city was also delayed.
"Ang pinaka-bottleneck namin diyan ay yung mga internet connections
although it is already being pilot tested," he said.
(Our main bottleneck is internet connection issues although it is already being pilot tested.)
"It's being used but there are certain things that need adjustments. 'Yung mga iba naman as simple things as hindi namin makabitan ng internet yung isang health center," he said, noting that some impoverished areas in the city have yet to have access to the internet.
(It's being used but there are certain things that need adjustments, while others involve simple things as the lack of internet connectivity in a health center.)
Last year, Metro Manila’s 4th richest city allocated 21 percent of its P12-billion budget for health projects.
In succeeding years, Pasig will allocate at least a quarter of its annual budget to health care, the Mayor said.
"For succeeding years, we can expect to peg the budget for health care at a minimum of 25 percent and at a maximum of 30-33 percent," he said.
Aside from health care, Sotto - who is vying for re-election - said that "more focus will be [given to] boosting the local economy" should he win another term.
"Being business-friendly is one of the things that I will personally take a look at and focus on in the next 1-2 years given the chance," he said, noting that in 2020 alone, about 5 percent of registered businesses in Pasig filed for retirement due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Ang focus natin (Our focus) is helping the local economy, helping businesses thrive which will necessarily provide more jobs for more Pasigueños," he said.
Pasig regularizes a third of some 10,000 city hall workers under Vico Sotto's first term
Katrina Domingo, ABS-CBN News
Pasig has regularized some 3,300 city hall workers in about 2 and a half years as the local government pushes to insulate its bureaucracy from politicking, Mayor Vico Sotto said.
Before July 2019, Pasig only had 955 regular workers out of some 10,000 people employed in the city hall, Sotto said in a recent interview with ABS-CBN News.
"When I assumed office, halos walang regular dito (there weren't a lot of regular workers here)," he said.
"Approximately 9 percent of the employees were regular. That's a very small number considering that the previous leadership had roughly 27 years to do this," he said, referring to the Eusebio dynasty, which has ruled Metro Manila's 4th richest city for nearly 3 decades.
There was a need to fix the labor status of city hall workers from "contractual", "job order" or "casual" positions to more regular posts to "remove the culture of systematic fear" among them, Sotto said.
"Noong naupo ako, maraming nag-advice sa akin - without mentioning names - na, 'Vico, kapag naging mayor ka, huwag ka mag-permanent.'"
(When I took office, a lot of people - without mentioning names - advised me , "Vico, if you become mayor, don't give permanent positions to workers.")
"Ang katwiran nila, kapag permanent na yan, hindi na takot yan mawalan ng trabaho, hindi na yan susunod sa iyo."
(Their reasoning is that if we make permanent positions for workers, they will no longer have the fear of losing their jobs, so they will no longer follow the mayor.)
"That's the thinking of many traditional politicians."
Several workers have been employed on a contractual basis for 20 years already, while one man held that labor status for nearly half a century, the mayor said.
"Forty-three years in service, he was [employed as a] casual [worker]," Sotto said.
"We're talking about dignity of labor, security of tenure," he said.
"We should insulate our bureaucracy from politics if we want a government that is truly merit-based, that is based on the competence and qualifications of our bureaucracy," he said.
Labor contractualization - or the practice of hiring long-term workers under a renewable 6-month contract - has been a long-standing problem in the Philippines as several Filipinos have been denied of benefits usually given to employees who hold a permanent status in a company or government office.
In 2018, President Rodrigo Duterte certified as urgent the Security of Tenure Bill, in a bid to give more job security to Filipino workers by prohibiting the practice of contractualization.
But Congress has yet to pass the measure 3 years since the President urged the legislative branch to end the said labor practice.
Duterte also made no mention of his supposed anti-contractualization push in his last State of the Nation Address in 2021.
Despite Sotto's program to address the problem of contractualization in Pasig, Vice Mayor Iyo Bernardo has questioned the mayor's hiring policy, saying key positions in the city hall have been awarded to non-Pasig residents.
"Nakakalungkot na ang Pasig, naging isang pelikula na lamang. Puro palabas," Bernardo said in a video uploaded on his Facebook page last month.
(It is sad that Pasig has been turned into a movie, all for show.)
"Nakakalungkot isipin na sinakop na tayo. Wala ka bang bilib sa kakayahan ng mga Pasigueño?" he said, without naming city hall officials.
(It's sad to think that we have been invaded. Are you not confident with the abilities of Pasigueños?)
"Ano ang mayroon sa mga nakaupo ngayon na taga-Quezon City at San Juan na wala sa mga pinamumunuan mo?" he said.
(What do Pasig city hall officials who are residents of Quezon City and San Juan have that your constituents do not have?)
In an earlier interview, Sotto said Bernardo should raise his issues "through formal mechanisms, not social media."
Sotto and Bernardo are both vying for Pasig's mayoralty post in the upcoming 2022 elections.
Sotto is seeking to be re-elected with a promise to continue his program of regularizing the employment status of more city hall workers.
"We're not going to stop there. May election ban. We will have to pause for a while," Sotto said.
"[But] It's beyond the regularization here or giving permanent status to the employees. It's about introducing a new brand not just of politics but of governance."
https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/02/18/22/pasig-regularizes-3300-workers-under-vicos-first-term