FACTS: Respondent Philippine National Oil Corporation-Energy Development Corporation (PNOC-EDC) is a government-owned and controlled corporation engaged in exploration, development, utilization, generation and distribution of energy resources like geothermal energy while the petitioner is a legitimate labor organization. The respondent hired and employed hundreds of employees on a contractual basis, majority of which become members of petitioner whereby, their employment was only good up to the completion or termination of the project and would automatically expire upon the completion of such project.
Sometime in 1998 when the project was about to be completed, the respondent proceeded to serve Notices of Termination of Employment upon the employees who are members of the petitioner. The petitioner filed a Notice of Strike with DOLE on the ground of purported commission by the latter of unfair labor practice for “refusal to bargain collectively, union busting and mass termination.”
ISSUE: Whether or not the officers and members of petitioner Union are project employees of respondent.
RULING: The officers and members of petitioner Union are project employees of respondent.
The Labor Code contemplates four (4) kinds of employees: (a) regular employees or those who have been “engaged to perform activities which are usually necessary or desirable in the usual business or trade of the employer”; (b) project employees or those “whose employment has been fixed for a specific project or undertaking, the completion or termination of which has been determined at the time of the engagement of the employee”; (c) seasonal employees or those who work or perform services which are seasonal in nature, and the employment is for the duration of the season; and (d) casual employees or those who are not regular, project, or seasonal employees. Jurisprudence has added a fifth kind— a fixed-term employee.
Project employment contracts which fix the employment for a specific project or undertaking remain valid under the law. By entering into such a contract, an employee is deemed to understand that his employment is coterminous with the project. He may not expect to be employed continuously beyond the completion of the project. It is of judicial notice that project employees engaged for manual services or those for special skills like those of carpenters or masons, are, as a rule, unschooled. However, this fact alone is not a valid reason for bestowing special treatment on them or for invalidating a contract of employment. Project employment contracts are not lopsided agreements in favor of only one party thereto. The employer’s interest is equally important as that of the employees for theirs is the interest that propels economic activity.
In the case at bar, the records reveal that the officers and the members of petitioner Union signed employment contracts indicating the specific project or phase of work for which they were hired, with a fixed period of employment. A deeper examination also shows that the individual members of petitioner Union indeed signed and accepted the employment contracts freely and voluntarily. No evidence was presented by petitioner Union to prove improper pressure or undue influence when they entered, perfected and consummated [the employment] contracts.
