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This refers to charges of electioneering and misfeasance in office against Director of Labor Agapito Burgos.

I

It is claimed that in October and November 1953 respondent delivered speeches in Baguio, Iloilo City and Claveria, Cagayan, exhorting the electorate to vote for the Liberal Party ticket and lambasting the Nacionalista Party candidates.

Denying vehemently the charge, the respondent alleges that in his speeches he merely tried to explain to the people the existing labor laws, particularly the Magna Carta of Labor, in accordance with the instructions of his Department Head; that he enlightened them on what the Administration then was doing for labor, just as he is also doing now under the present regime in his periodic trips to the provinces; and that those speeches of his were made at labor rallies where he abstained completely from touching on political issues.

Respondent stresses the fact that he was appointed to his present position during the last Administration, not because of political considerations, but because of merit and faithful service to the Government for a span of more than thirty years. After devoting the best years of his life as a career man who has risen from the ranks, he knew better, he says, than to endanger his post by engaging in politics; so much so that when he was quoted in a popular daily as having spoken in Iloilo City against the Nacionalista Party presidential standard bearer in the 1953 general elections he lost no time in denying the report attributed to him, which denial was published in the same paper the following day, long before the elections.

After a serious reflection on the matter, I am inclined to believe respondent’s representations. He is therefore cleared of the electioneering charge.

II

Under the second charge, which was filed by the A. T. Suaco Employees Union (N.L.U.), it is alleged that respondent, without first investigating the facts, wrote a letter dated March 16, 1954, to the A. T. Suaco & Co. that it could replace certain employees thereof provided that they were given one-month separation pay, in view of which nine union men were forthwith separated.

Investigation discloses that the letter in question was signed by the respondent in answer to a legal query of the company and after a conference between its representatives and the Chief of the Public Defender’s Division of the Bureau of Labor (who prepared said letter), during which the company’s determination to weed out nine temporary employees was bared. There is no evidence of any connivance between the company and the respondent who was not aware of the strained relations between it and the labor union therein. I am satisfied that the respondent acted in good faith, and he is therefore also absolved from this charge as recommended by the Secretary of Labor. However, he is admonished to be more careful in the future in signing official communications which may be susceptible to interpretations derogatory to the purpose and mission of his office.

Done in the City of Manila, this 11th day of July, in the Year of Our Lord nineteen hundred and fifty-six, and of the Independence of the Philippines, the eleventh.

(Sgd.) RAMON MAGSAYSAY
President of the Philippines

By the President:
(Sgd.) FORTUNATO DE LEON
Executive Secretary