Philippines: World’s first BPO political party
By Poli Tech

November 24, 2009 was a historical day for all call center and BPO agents in Philippines as their very own political party was finally launched in full glare of the national media. The Association of Call Center and BPO Agents of the Philippines, the very first BPO employee political party in the world was launched.

This political party was auspiciously launched in time for the 2010 national elections.

Their main goal is to have 1-3 call center agents elected in Congress to represent the growing BPO workers’ population. This was made possible when this top BPO country destination enacted into law that groups representing a particular sector of society can be elected to present their viewpoints on the floor of Congress. ACCAP, as it is now more popularly known, was formed back in 2007 by call center agents led by Kevin Carreon who himself is a call center agent of a pioneer Philippine call center Eperfomax. The rest of his group representing ACCAP are call center agents, managers and senior managers from major call centers. Their supporting cast handling public relations, organization and fund raising are current executives and pioneers in the call center and Telecom industry. The ACCAP group advocates better treatment of outsourced employees as well as better business of outsourcing companies.

In the press conference, the young ACCAP founder and Secretary General Kevin Carreon laid out plans of establishing a government-mandated retirement plan for all BPO employees in the Philippines to ensure comfortable retirement. It also plans create an “umbrella” administrative body that shall address all possible needs of its constituents in terms of financial freedom, legal support, emergency situations, education, gainful employment and fair remuneration.

According to ACCAP’s campaign manager, the press conference was a resounding success judging from the immediate media reporters’ feedback. He also feels that next year’s national election is the perfect time to elect a call center agent congressman because by this year’s end, the BPO workers population in the Philippines would already total over 1 million. They are only required to receive at least 200,000 to nominate 1 congressman from their fold and if they get at least 700,000 votes they can send as much as 3 congressmen which will make them a real political force to contend with in Congress. In my conversations with the rest of the elders in ACCAP, they recognize that organizing and mobilizing call center employee voters will be both the biggest challenge and key to their success. However, they feel comfortable with the initial feedback they are getting. In fact, they have also been getting feelers from a lot of major political parties including one that represents the current most popular President and Vice-Presidential candidates in the Philippines.

When their goals are finally realized, the Philippines would be the first country in the world to have BPO employees play a major role in shaping up its country’s future.