PCART rally at Shangri-La Hotel, re: anti-Sin Tax

PEOPLES' COALITION AGAINST REGRESSIVE TAXATION (PCART)

PRESS RELEASE

05 December 2012

Workers, Vendors, and Sari-sari Store Owners Offer Prayers 

for the Salvation of their Jobs and Livelihoods

Four thousand workers, takatak vendors and sari-sari store owners occupied the grounds around the Shangri-La Hotel, as Bicameral Committee Conference deliberates on the contentions of the sin tax bill. The members of the Peoples Coalition Against Regressive Taxation (PCART) offered prayers to seek compassion for their jobs and livelihoods. The anti-sin tax coalition also expressed their disappointment at the senators and congressmen who disregarded their pleas during the deliberation of the Sin Tax Bill in their respective chambers. 

The group appealed to the participants of Bicameral Committee Conference to stand with them in protecting their jobs even if the bicameral session is just a few notches before it is presented to President Benigno Aquino III. The new tax measure entails job losses and the decrease in revenue of takatak vendors and sari-sari stores owners. PCART remained optimistic that their appeal will awaken the conscience of the lawmakers and increase the possibility that President Aquino will veto the sin tax bill. 

According to Edwin Guarin, spokesperson of PCART, “The government should consider the millions of workers about to lose their jobs and the general welfare of their families. It is our duty as citizens to remind the government officials that exacerbating poverty will only make the country's Millennium Development Goals unattainable and drive our countrymen to economic misery”. 

The anti-sin tax alliance reprimanded the members of the Bicameral Committee Conference and urged them to side with our poor countrymen because the sin tax bill will be an additional burden to them and will only intensify the widening economic gap between the have and have-nots.