Today Sunday, November 10, 1996
Today's Mail
THIS concerns the news story filed by Mr. Richard Arboleda and headlined "PAL Normalizes Operations as Strike Ends" (back page, November 4) in which he wrote:
"A source at the labor department said that the personal interest of some Palea [PAL Employees Association] lawyers also became a problem. The source alleged that the lawyers also serve as counsel for another airline and that part of their agenda was to allow the rival airline to take advantage of grounded PAL planes to service displaced passengers. The source refused to identify the concerned union lawyers."
Our law firm acted as counsel for the striking workers of Palea throughout the entire strike: two senior partners and four associates no less were involved in the various legal matters relative to the strike. Mr. Arboleda himself was witness to the negotiations at the Office of the Secretary on October 31. He was also at the news conference of Palea on November 1 and met some of our lawyers there. Mr. Arboleda himself called up one of our associates on November 2 during the latter stages of the negotiations on the memorandum of agreement entered into by PAL and Palea, without the assistance of the labor department.
Despite the refusal of Mr. Arboleda's source to identify the "concerned union lawyers," we are certain that he/she/it is alluding to our firm and that Mr. Arboleda knew that he/she/it was referring to us.
Our law firm denies this canard by Mr. Arboleda's source who, conveniently and in typical cowardly fashion, refuses to identify himself. We do not lawyer for any other domestic or foreign airline, be it Grand Air Cebu Pacific, Asiana or what have you, and Mr. Arboleda and his source are free to drop in anytime to check our office records. Our office records will reveal that at no point during our firm's existence have we lawyered for any other airline. It is, therefore, malicious of Mr. Arboleda's source to drop this piece of disinformation and refuse to substantiate it.
Attributing the motivation behind the strike to alleged "personal interest" on our part not only trivializes the substantive issues and grievances of the striking workers of Palea but also maligns and defames our law firm based solely on the statements of an alleged source. Moreover, it defames our firm in the eyes of the public—as well as with Palea and all the other labor unions we serve—by painting us as irresponsible and reckless lawyers who would urge their clients to strike for our personal benefit.
It is, however, not difficult to understand the motivation behind Mr. Arboleda's source: it is vindictiveness and a measure of self-satisfaction on the part of some senior labor officials and a petty attempt to get back at us for exposing their self-interest and political posturing—which led to the strike being prolonged instead of being settled on October 31—during the news conference of November 1.
It is interesting to note that not one of those specifically named in the news conference has stepped forward to deny the events that happened on October 31, as well as the motivations behind such events. Instead, these officials have now asked an unnamed source to make a "deniable" statement to Mr. Arboleda.
In the interest of fair play, may we request Mr. Arboleda to drop by the office and confirm for himself whether we lawyer for any other airline and, after doing so, to please correct the malicious and misleading innuendo his alleged "source" fed him?
Or if Mr. Arboleda so pleases, he may identify his alleged "source" so that we may sue him/her/it for libel and do the Filipino people a favor by sending another misfit in government to jail.
ARNO V. SANIDAD
Sanchez Rozales Sanidad
& Abaya Law Firm
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