U.S. Servicemen Cook, Collect Trash at Big Bases as Filipinos Strike for 3rd Day

American servicemen took over jobs as cooks and trash collectors Sunday as an estimated 22,000 striking Filipino workers continued to blockade the main entrances to the United States’ largest overseas naval base for the third day. U.S. officials said military operations were not affected.

No talks were scheduled on breaking the impasse with the workers, who began the strike Friday after U.S. officials rejected a key union contract demand.

Officials reported pickets at four of the seven U.S. facilities north of Manila, including the largest overseas U.S. air and naval installations--Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Base.

The strikers reportedly allowed American servicemen to enter Clark, but no one was allowed to enter or leave Subic through its main entrances. However, Mayor Richard Gordon of Olongapo, outside Subic, said outriggers were picking up some sailors from nearby beaches and returning them to the base by water.

U.S. officials have told the strikers that negotiations will not resume until all American servicemen are allowed to return to base.

Stabbings Reported

No violence was reported Sunday. Clashes between picketers and servicemen at Subic, the sprawling logistics and repair center of the U.S. 7th Fleet, left nine servicemen injured Friday night and Saturday, U.S. officials said.

U.S. officials said they have found no evidence to support union charges that six Filipino workers were hospitalized after they were stabbed by eight Marines, apparently intoxicated, who tried to cross a picket line set up at Subic’s main gate Friday night.

U.S. officials said the walkout has had a negligible effect on military operations. The main runway at Clark has been closed for repairs all month, so there are few incoming flights. In addition, there are no ships at Subic for either liberty call or repairs, the officials said.

But “non-essential” operations were disrupted. At Clark, home of the 13th Air Force, 60 miles north of Manila, two movie theaters and a post exchange for the 11,000 military personnel were shut down. The post exchanges at the Camp John Hay recreation base were also closed, a Clark spokesman said.

Contract Talks Collapse

U.S. servicemen took over jobs as cooks, telephone repairmen and trash collectors and as maintenance men at water treatment and power plants at Clark and Subic.

The strike, the fourth since 1976, began after the collapse of talks on a three-year contract. The negotiations began in May.

U.S. negotiators accepted the major worker demands, including an annual bonus and increased hospitalization benefits, but authorities said Washington rejected a key demand--the granting of severance pay upon resignation.

In Manila, meanwhile, President Corazon Aquino asked Filipinos for “huge doses of patience” with their new government as it seeks to undo 20 years of economic and social damage she said was caused by former President Ferdinand E. Marcos.

“I promised our people fundamental change, and we have indeed begun to affect fundamental change,” Aquino told the commencement of St. Scholastica’s College.

“In my first 100 days of office, what I hope to accomplish is to set firm directions toward political normalization and economic recovery, while the government strives to maintain the delivery of essential public services,” she said.

Aquino acknowledged that Filipinos’ patience “has run extremely thin,” adding: “There is still too much hunger, there is still too much misery. Far too many of our people live in dire poverty, far too few of our people have adequate work.”

She cautioned, “We must never allow people power to be misused for the selfish interest of a few or, worse, as a tool for sheer, unwarranted harassment, intimidation, or personal vendettas.”

Cabinet officials have said Aquino will announce by Tuesday whether she will proclaim a provisional constitution to reform the autocratic bureaucracy left by Marcos.

A Cabinet official last Thursday released a draft provisional constitution that would declare a “revolutionary government” and empower Aquino to dissolve the National Assembly. The draft also would prohibit any court from questioning her authority, pending a referendum on a permanent constitution.

The official who released the document said Aquino wants to tone down some aspects of the draft and delete references to the government as “revolutionary.”

Also Sunday, the Information Ministry said Aquino’s office will pay the medical bills of Marcos’ 93-year-old mother, who has been hospitalized for eight years.

A local newspaper columnist recently wrote that Josefa Edralin Marcos, a widow, did not have the money to pay her bills at the Philippine Heart Center in suburban Manila.