Regent eyes Pasig exit as Vico Sotto sides with striking workers

MANILA – Snack food maker Regent Foods Corp said Tuesday it was "contemplating" moving its business out of Pasig City after Mayor Vico Sotto, sided with a group of striking workers.

Sotto over the weekend urged the maker of Cheese Ring and Sweet Corn snacks to drop charges against 23 workers. Regent said a written request sent to Sotto's office seeking help to settle the strike "merely fell on deaf ears."

The strike was "unlawful," Regent said, adding the 23 employees tried to stop their non-striking colleagues from reporting to work and that a security officer was attacked with "sharp weapons."

Twelve of the 23 who were arrested last Nov. 9 have posted bail, Sotto earlier said.

• Vico Sotto tells Regent Foods to drop charges vs protesting workers
• Labor dept eyes dialogue with Regent Foods for release of jailed workers

"RFC may simply accept its fate that the Pasig City Administration will unjustly make life hard for it and its 400-strong workforce, and contemplate simply bringing its business elsewhere—a truly painful outcome for a corporation that has considered Pasig City its home for a total of three decades now," Regent said.

"RFC did not order their arrest, and RFC did not even participate in the preliminary investigation of these individuals… Mayor Vico deliberately overlooks that RFC is not the complainant who pressed these criminal charges," it said.

Regent said it would protect and compensate non-striking employees even as the labor issue “completely stifled” its business.