SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico- Governor Luis Fortuño's March 3 announcement indicating his intension to slash “more than 30,000” government jobs in the coming months has sparked outraged within the civil service and resulted in massive protests over the weekend.
Members of the Puerto Rican Workers Central Union, the Puerto Rican Workers Syndicate and the Teachers Federations gathered outside of the governor’s mansion as a sign of solidarity against Fortuño's proposed budget-saving firings.
In the governor’s Tuesday address he stated that the government payroll had skyrocketed from $3.75 billion in 2001 to $5.53 billion in 2009, a factor he claimed had contributed significantly to the islands $3.2 billion deficit.
“We all must confront the reality of a bankrupt government,” Fortuño said in his address. “The moment for action is now. It's up to all of us to put our house in order.”
He further stated that if the government jobs were not cut Puerto Rico stood the chance of having its credit downgraded, which he estimated would cut government pensions in half and result in the loss of 130,000 private sector jobs.
The estimated 30,000 government workers scheduled to lose their jobs were encouraged by Fortuño to seek positions in the private sector, but the protesting unions said that this was not a viable option for the government workers.
Puerto Rican Workers Federation President José Rodríguez Báez proclaimed at the protest that “the private sector is not going to hire…because there are no jobs in that area either”, and if the government went ahead with its plans to fire the workers the unions would not hesitate stage further actions against the government.
The unions encouraged the workers not to voluntarily quit their jobs or sign any documentation from their human resource departments or the Office of Budget and Management.
The job cuts are expected to begin as early as July 1, though the union workers said that they would be taking a zero tolerance policy on the cuts and would attempt to save every job they could.
Puerto Rico News