CAGAYAN DE ORO — Labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU) called the wage increases in most of the regions in Mindanao as an “abomination”, given the struggle of working Filipinos to survive amid the increasing prices of basic goods and services.
Salary increases ranging from P30 to P50 were recently implemented in most of the regions in Mindanao. KMU insists that it is not enough.
“While we create huge profits for the companies, the government is taking taxes that they are stealing,” Jerome Adonis, KMU chairperson, told Bulatlat.
Among the Mindanao regions that issued new wage orders since the last quarter of 2025 were Soccsksargen, Caraga, Zamboanga Peninsula, and Northern Mindanao. The majority of these orders will be implemented in two tranches.
In June last year, the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) government signed a wage order granting a P50 increase to the daily minimum wage across the region.
The last wage order in the Davao Region, meanwhile, was released on March 7, 2025, granting a P29 increase.
Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Boards (RTWPB), based on the Omnibus Rules on Minimum Wage Determination, are only authorized to commence the minimum wage determination process, motu proprio or upon petition, within 60 days before the anniversary date of the last wage orders in their regions.
With the full implementation of the current wage orders, for non-agricultural workers, only the Davao Region and the major cities and municipalities in Northern Mindanao will reach the P500 mark. The Bangsamoro region remains at the P300 mark, except for Cotabato City, which has a daily minimum wage of P411.
Despite the increase, the wage gap from the daily living wage remains significant, as research group IBON Foundation reported that the average daily living wage for a family of five in the country stood at P1,240. Hence, KMU is pushing for a national daily minimum wage of P1,200.
Tita Hadman, Northern Mindanao coordinator for t8he National Federation of Labor Unions – KMU, told Bulatlat that she and her group pushed for a P200-wage increase when they attended a public hearing organized by RTWPB Region 10 prior to the issuance of new wage orders. But their call fell on deaf ears.
In an earlier statement, Sentro ng mga Nagkakaisa at Progresibong Manggagawa called on the administration of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to at least pass the long-overdue P200 across-the-board daily minimum wage increase—the bare minimum, the group said, for workers to have a fighting chance to recover from inflation.
“However, workers deserve more than the bare minimum,” the group added.
During the 19th Congress, the House of Representatives passed the P200 Across-the-Board Daily Wage Increase Act in June 2025, but this was different from the Senate version, which approved a P100 increase in the daily minimum wage for workers in the private sector.
There was already a conference committee created to tackle these measures, but both the House and the Senate were not able to ratify this before the sine die adjournment of the 19th Congress in the same month.
Adonis urged millions of Filipino workers and ordinary citizens to strengthen their unity to “force the reactionary government of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to enact the national daily minimum wage of P1,200.” (RTS, RVO)
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