By Annabel Consuelo Petinglay/PNA
SAN JOSE DE BUENAVISTA, Antique — The provincial capitol of Antique is at risk of losing the services of its security guards due to financial constraint.
The security guards are assigned at the new and old capitol building, as well as in other facilities of the provincial government.
Galileo Magbanua, Antique Provincial Information Officer, said in an interview Tuesday that Antique Governor Rhodora J. Cadiao is expected to issue an Executive Order anytime during the day on the non-renewal of job order employees, as well as the security guards due to lack of funds for their salaries.
“There are about 53 security guards who will be affected,” he said.
The security guards are being outsourced by the provincial government from the High Profile Security Agency. The non-renewal of their service came at such a time when the security measure at the new capitol has been strengthened due to a recent bomb threat.
Meanwhile, more or less 1,500 job order employees despite being informed that there is no budget for their salaries kept on reporting to work in the hope that they could be renewed. “The job orders remain hopeful,” he said.
He said that these job order employees are also willing to do volunteer work for the provincial government until they could be renewed.
The 2019 proposed provincial budget of PHP1,421,418,085 is still being deliberated by the provincial board.
The board continues to question some of the items in the 2019 budget, such as the purchase of sanitary toilets for poor households.
They also want to slash the PHP10-million budget for the Aid to Individuals in Crisis Situation.
