BULACAN STATE UNIVERSITY

COLLEGE OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE EDUCATION

Brgy. Guinhawa, City of Malolos, Bulacan

Unprotected and Uncompensated Internships / On-The-Job Trainings

in the Philippines, a Form of Disguised and Modern-Day Labor Exploitation?

Submitted by:
Navales, Kurt Derhen B.
(2015-164582)
AB Legal Management 4A

Submitted to:
Atty. Eduardo Cezar D. Gaanan, Jr.
LSR 413 LM

22 January 2019
I. Background of the Issue

The Commission on Higher Education (CHED), on its CHED

Memorandum Order No. 104, series 2017, in accordance with Republic Act
No. 7722 or the Higher Education Act of 1992, as an amendment to the
previous CHED Memorandum Order No. 23, series 2009 or the Guidelines for
the Student Internship Program in the Philippines (SIPP), defined the term
internship as “the practical application of classroom learning to the actual in a
regular work environment such as but not limited to commercial and industrial
services, government and non-government agencies; and is synonymous to
practicum, field practice, or On-the-Job Training.” The law also provides for the
coverage that it must not be considered as a form of apprenticeship and/or
learnership, as may be defined by the Labor Code of the Philippines and
Republic Act No. 7796 or shortly known as the Technical Educational and
Skills Development Act (TESDA) of 1994. Shortly speaking, the protection and
rights specifically laid down under the Labor Code do not include student
interns.

This type of learning has been a common degree prerequisite to

undergraduate students as a form of higher level of education with an aim of
educating students by them learning the actual environment of the work field
due to the fact that students are honed by the country as its economic assets.
The students, at the same time, which mostly desire to have their own identity
and place as prospective members of the working class after graduating, want
to experience the working environment aligned to their own degrees
beforehand.

Therefore, it benefits four sectors: (1) the intern-to-be students, on

garnering working experiences before graduating, broadening their knowledge
in their respective tracks, and applying the knowledge they acquired through
their classroom or formal educations; (2) the academic institutions, on making
their graduates highly competitive and at the same time inviting more enrollees
who want to experience internship; (3) the national economy, on having
workers and laborers that possess higher level of skills and competencies
from trainings as interns; and (4) the business enterprises, termed by CHED
Memorandum Order No. 104, series 2017 as the Host Training Establishments
(HTE), where the labor issue comes, which may receive free labor services
for they are not required by any law to compensate nor be liable to the interns
they recruited who can possibly render the same services any regular
employee may provide for them due to the connotation that this is a form of
education, as what is provided under the same CHED Memorandum Order,
and does not have any employer-employee relationship in it.
 The specific limitation under CHED Memorandum Order No. 104, series
2017 which provides that internship is NOT considered as apprenticeship or
learnership, which the Labor Code of the Philippines provides for the
definitions, qualifications, rights of the latter two. An apprenticeable
occupation, as what Article 58 defines, means “any trade, form of employment,
or occupation which requires more than three (3) months of practical training
on the job supplemented by related theoretical instruction.” Apprentices are
entitled to wages undertaken by the apprenticeship agreement between the
employer and the apprentice. Specifically cited under Article 72 of the same
Labor Code are those apprentices who are not entitled to compensation, and
they are those: (1) whose training on the job is required by the school or the
training program curriculum; or (2) whose training on the job is taken as
requisite for graduation or board examination. Learners, on the other hand, are
defined under Article 73 as “persons hired as trainees in semi-skilled and other
industrial occupations which are non-apprenticeable and which may be
learned through practical training on the job in a relatively short period of time
which shall not exceed three (3) months.”

The Labor Code of the Philippines does not provide any explicit specific
provision for the protection and rights of student interns hired under their
custody as HTEs. The only protection provided for them is the required
execution of the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) between the higher
educational institutes (HEI) and the HTEs which covers, as what is stated
under the CHED Memorandum Order No. 104, series 2017, the “detailed roles
and responsibilities of all concerned parties, safety of student interns, training
plans, learning objectives, and methods of evaluation.” Included as well that
the contracting HEI assumes fully the responsibility over the students in in the
CHED Memorandum Order is the duration of the internship, including:
providing free medical and dental services; insurance coverage to include
travel, medical, and health; orientation to work issues, work ethics and laws
against sexual harassment; safeguarding and monitoring student interns
against exploitation, harassment, and deplorable work conditions.

There is also a provision for the obligations of HTEs that interns must
not perform tasks and duties of the same with the level of regular work
positions in the HTEs, but the contrary to such rule is evidently present,
especially those HTEs abroad who hire their interns in the Philippines. One
case was cited by Japan Times (2018) wherein one report of labor exhaustion
was received from an intern from the Philippines who was hired in a
construction firm in Japan and was engaged to work for 72 hours a week and
was paid only ¥70,000 a month.

The Asahi Simbun (2018) reported that Mitsubishi Motors of the same
country was accused of ordering 33 trainees from the Philippines to work
inappropriately, far from what is defined in their internship contract, wherein
such allegations the business giant denied. At another automotive company
from the same country, Nissan Motors, the same media outlet reported that
there were a total of 45 interns from the Philippines and Indonesia who carried
out duties that fell outside their training parameters. Both companies stated
that they thought they have the autonomy to determine the tasks for the
foreign trainees, in which thereafter resulted in the inappropriate work
assignments but none claimed responsibility to the labor incidents.

On the other side of the globe, a Southern Californian oceanfront resort

named Terranea Resort was accused of trafficking and exploiting Asian
interns, majority of which are Filipinos. The Philippine Daily Inquirer, wrote in
2018, from Los Angeles Times report, that someone named Jon Tuason was
recruited as a culinary student intern from the Philippines but such, along with
other interns, were said to perform the same tasks as regular Cook III workers,
but had to pay high placement fees, were paid less, and never received
benefits nor raises. Interns feared of reporting their situation to higher
authorities due to the threat of possibly losing their visas.

Locally, the Alliance of Young Nurse Leaders & Advocates International,

Inc. (AYNLA) National President Alvin Cloyd Dakis, at the observance of the
International Nurses Day in 2011, exposed the problem of many nurses in the
Philippines regarding the on-the-job trainings for newly-registered nurses, the
alleged exploitation of nurses where they have to pay fees in exchange of their
volunteer work in hospitals. AYNLA, together with other nurses groups and
the Partido ng Manggagawa (PM), an activist political party, testified to the
truth of these allegations, that hospitals have been collecting OJT fees on
many of the unemployed nurses in the country.

Reported by SunStar Philippines in 2017, a case of sexual harassment

was filed by a 19 year-old female intern in 2016 at Cotabato City. Decided not
to expose her name in public, she charged Noel Yuson Punzalan, a senior
news editor of the News and Information Bureau, Philippine News Agency,
with Acts of Lasciviousness and the violation of the Anti-Sexual Harassment
Act. The harassed student-intern claimed that she was assigned in Mindanao
Cross, a printing center in the city, and was under the supervision of his
mentor, a certain Carlos Bautista. While in the exercise of her duties as an
intern, which is a press conference about the Bangsamoro Basic Law, she met
the accused as a fellow journalist and randomly messaged her in her
Facebook account, asking if he can borrow her laptop to make some edits in
his work. Immediately, the accused hugged the intern and touched her private
parts. The accused specifically denied the allegations and claimed that the
complainant is the one who befriended him on Facebook. Despite of these, the
Ombudsman ruled in favor of the harassed complainant on having a valid
probable cause against the accused Punzalan and must be liable for the
criminal charges filed against him.

Meanwhile, there is an existing Senate Bill No. 1642 which is An Act

Institutionalizing the Implementation of the Government Internship Program,
Providing Funds for its Implementation, and for other purposes or the
“Government Internship Program (GIP) Act of 2017” which provides, in its
Internship Guidelines, that government interns must be “provided a stipend
amounting to the seventy-five percent (75%) of the existing salary of Step 1
Salary Grade 1 of the current government salary standardization law and the
same shall not be taxable.” But, same with the CHED Memorandum Order No.
104, series 2017, interns are not considered employees and thus no
employer-employee relationship exists between the employer, which are the
government institutions, and the interns. Protections in favor of the interns
against beyond official working duties are also laid down in the law proposal.

However, the proposed Senate Bill only provides for those of recruited
interns within the government institutions and still not covers those interns
recruited in the private sectors, especially those abroad, which are left
unprotected by the labor laws of this country.

Former Vice President and former Presidential Adviser on OFW

Concerns Jejomar Binay back in 2012 expressed his contentions regarding the
popular on-the-job training program as an “unpaid or underpaid labor” and
opens the doors for exploitation of Filipino students, and recognized
internships as a form of “modern-day slavery,” most especially to those hotel
and restaurant management and other tourism-related courses students who
are required to perform their internships abroad, left with no protection from
Labor and Immigration departments of the Philippines. In his theory, he further
asked on why foreign countries would get workers from other countries such
as the Philippines if they also have their own students in their own. He further
suggested that these students who perform their internships abroad must be
considered quasi-Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) and must have the very
least the same protection with regular OFWs in the duration of their internship
abroad.

The Commission of Higher Education then Chairman Dr. Patricia B.

Licuanan thereafter responded to Vice President Binay’s worry and stated that
they addressed the issue and suspended the implementation of CHED
Memorandum Order No. 22, series 2010 and published new guidelines in
CHED Memorandum Order No. 13, series 2011 with more secured internships
abroad as interns are being indorsed by CHED to the Bureau of Immigration.
Thus resulting to the formulation of the CHED Memorandum Order No. 104,
series 2017.

Department of Education (DepEd) Secretary and former National

Treasurer Prof. Leonor Magtolis – Briones also opinionated in 2012 that
business firms must pay interns who use their labor services. Furthermore,
she suggested that schools and companies must stop letting the interns pay
for their trainings, more importantly because of the presence of the additional
two years in high school education as part of the Enhanced Basic Education
Act or more known as the “K-to-12 program” as internship is also an added
part of the prerequisite for the last year (Grade 12) in senior high school
students’ graduation. The reason of this suggestion by Secretary Briones is
that with the implementation of K-to-12 program, high school drop outs
increased with the fact these drop outs, due to poverty, have chosen to work in
the agriculture and farming sectors, where these drop outs get paid while in
training, while if they maintained in school, they will be the ones who will pay
for their own trainings. The high amounts of payments required to finish
secondary education discouraged poor students in continuing senior high
school and higher educations.

II. How should the issue be handled/ remedied?

Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) Region 11 Director

Joffrey M. Suyao said in 2016 that DepEd Secretary Briones’ proposal
regarding the compensation of the on-the-job training students would be
possible but guidelines should first be put in place to prevent possible abuses
on the other party which is the academe (HEI) and the companies (HTE),
further explaining that this may bring adversities as companies may no longer
see it necessary for them to hire regular employees because they can just tap
the OJT students to work for them. On the part of the students, he further
stated that there are some who abuse the program wherein graduates still go
into OJTs with compensation even though these are already beyond their
school requirement.

Proposing that lawmakers should set clear guidelines and safety nets in
order to avoid these abuses, DOLE Region 11 Director Suyao added that if
such law in favor of OJT compensation will be made and passed, it must
maximize the time that the students allocate for internship and ensure that
they are learning during the program.
III. References

Colina IV, A. (2016). Paying OJTs possible, says DOLE official. MindaNews.
Retrieved from https://www.mindanews.com/top-stories/2016/06/paying-
ojts-possible-says-dole-official/

Espina Varona, I., (2016). Next DepEd chief: OJT students should be paid.
ABS-CBN News. Retrieved from https://news.abs-
cbn.com/focus/06/06/16/next-deped-chief-ojt-students-should-be-paid.
Commission on Higher Education

Licuanan, P. (2012). CHED assures public plight of Pinoy OJTs abroad are
addressed. Retrieved from https://ched.gov.ph/wp-
content/uploads/2017/09/CHED-assures-public-plight-of-Pinoy-OJTs-
abroad-are-addressed.pdf

Maegawa, H. & Shimada, K. (2018). Exploitation of foreign interns thrives

under lax supervision. The Asahi Shimbun. Retrieved from
http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201807090006.html

Partido Manggagawa. (2011). Labor party, nurse group join hands for RH on
Nurses Day – Partido ng Manggagawa. Human Rights Online
Philippines. Retrieved from https://hronlineph.com/2011/05/15/press-
release-labor-party-nurse-group-join-hands-for-rh-on-nurses-day-
partido-ng-manggagawa/

Senate of the Philippines. (2018). An act institutionalizing the

implementation of the government internship program, providing funds
for its implementation and for other purposes. Retrieved from
http://senate.gov.ph/lis/bill_res.aspx?congress=17&q=SBN-1642

Tejano, I. (2017). Gov't news editor sued by intern for sexual harassment.
SunStar Philippines. Retrieved from
https://www.sunstar.com.ph/article/133862

The Japan Times Opinion. (2018) Address issues in the technical intern
program. Retrieved from
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2018/11/21/editorials/address-
issues-technical-intern-program/#.XEXjbtIzZH3

Varona, R. (2018). Luxury US resort accused of trafficking Filipinos, other

Asians. The Philippine Daily Inquirer. Retrieved from
https://globalnation.inquirer.net/163272/luxury-us-resort-accused-
trafficking-filipinos-asians