Sources: Sun Star and Philippines public holidays. Following-up on our earlier post, we have just learned that, late this afternoon (Manila time), during his weekly press conference, Executive Secretary, Eduardo Ermita, announced that Philippines President, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, had issued Proclamation 1279 which makes Monday, May 14, 2007, the day of the upcoming mid-term elections, a non-working holiday throughout the country “to give the people the fullest opportunity to exercise their right of suffrage”.In the same announcement, the Executive Secretary reiterated that April 30 is a regular working day and that the May Day, or Labor Day, public holiday will be observed on Tuesday May 1, 2007 (see our post of yesterday).
Analysis: As per article 94-c of the Labour Code, the day of a general election is a public holiday in the Philippines. However, Executive Order 203 dated June 30, 1987, was later issued, aiming to list exhaustively all "regular holidays" and "special days" (both terms which, to this day, remain unclear in their definition), in effect superseding article 94-c of the Labour Code. But, in fact, Executive Order 203 was followed almost every year by a last-minute announcement that the upcoming election day would indeed be a public holiday. When we say "last-minute", we really mean it; in 2004, the general election "nationwide special public holiday" was declared through Proclamation 628, of May 6, 2004, only four days before the May 10, 2004, election date.
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