The fair and effective management of human resources is fundamental to ensuring professionalism, efficiency, and integrity in public service delivery.
With this in mind, Mayor Leni Robredo signed and issued Executive Order No. 023, instituting reforms in human resource management to correct prevailing practices and ensure fairness, merit, and accountability in the city government of Naga.
A provision in the directive states that past audits, civil service assessments, and personnel feedback have consistently revealed the absence of a codified, merit-based personnel framework within the city government.
These outdated and politicized practices have led to deplorable outcomes, including ad hoc hiring and promotion decisions, overlapping and redundant positions, circumvention of competitive selection through short-term contracts, and unequal access to training and development opportunities.
Quoting a provision of the EO, the mayor underscored that these practices have contributed to the erosion of staff morale, the weakening of professional standards, the misuse of public funds, and a growing loss of public trust in the city government.
Preliminary budget analysis shows that approximately P1.1 billion of the city government’s P1.8 billion annual budget is allocated to personnel compensation alone, significantly reducing resources available for critical social services and frontline service delivery.
Mayor Robredo emphasized that the continued absence of a clear, transparent, and consistently enforced human resource policy framework has allowed these unsustainable practices to persist.
To address this, she is instituting reforms by adopting and institutionalizing manuals on Recruitment, Selection, Placement, and Induction; Promotion Procedures; and Training and Development — with the aim of establishing a professionalized, merit-based, and accountable system that will guide all personnel actions within the city government. | via Jason B. Neola
