VICE President Leni G. Robredo on Tuesday urged President Duterte to provide jobs for Filipinos first, rather than letting an unbridled flow of Chinese workers enter the country.
“I think it is wrong to let our countrymen leave [the Philippines] and give space for Chinese workers here,” Robredo said on the sidelines of the “Ka Pepe Diokno Human Rights Award 2019,” a recognition for democracy advocates named in honor of the late Sen. Jose W. Diokno.
“For me, there is one patently wrong there [Duterte’s policy to allow Chinese to work in the Philippines]. Because the very goal of the government is how to bring back Filipino workers abroad here in the country,” Robredo said, reiterating that the priority in providing jobs should be the Filipinos.
She also assailed President Duterte for saying that the government cannot be too aggressive in cracking down on Chinese workers in the Philippines since Beijing could do the same to 300,000 Filipinos in China.
“Why can’t we provide good working conditions here so that the Filipinos will no longer work abroad and leave their family?” Robredo asked.
In the last three years, the Department of Labor said that roughly half of the 169,000 Alien Employment Permits issued by the agency went to Chinese nationals, a third of which are in support services, including offshore gaming.
The Senate labor committee is currently investigating the influx of hundreds of thousands of Chinese workers in the country, many of them believed to be illegals and employed in offshore gaming and in construction.