THE Senate approved on third and final reading Tuesday night a Malacañang-certified bill creating the Department of Migrant Workers, with one senator tagging it the “best Christmas gift” to overseas Filipino workers and peers expressing confidence it would lead to a more rationalized and coordinated approach to caring for an important sector that has shored up the economy for nearly five decades.
“I would not want to lose this opportunity to congratulate all our kababayans overseas on this historic victory,” administration Senator Ronald De la Rosa, the bill’s main sponsor, said, following its approval in plenary deliberations presided by Senate President Vicente Sotto III.
Senator Richard Gordon likewise lauded timely passage of the legislation creating the OFW department, which the chairman of the Senate Labor committee, Sen. Joel Villanueva, had defended on the floor for the past weeks.
Gordon earlier introduced key amendments adopted by De la Rosa that were carried in the approved version of Senate Bill 2234. One is “empowering and requiring the DMW, in coordination with the Department of Foreign Affairs, to conduct regular, timely, and relevant political and security risk assessment in particular to the OFW-receiving country.” This includes evacuation plans to be coordinated with OFWs, not only for immediate deployment but also in cases of emergencies requiring swift action, such as their possible evacuation within a host country, or within a region.
Gordon recalled that since the Covid-19 pandemic started in March 2020, the government has repatriated thousands of OFWs displaced from their work abroad. Official figures show that 785,448 OFWs have been repatriated under a whole-of-government approach involving several agencies led by the DFA and the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE).
Gordon’s second amendment provided “an additional power to the DMW Secretary to terminate, suspend, or impose a total ban of foreign workers to a particular country.” It allows the immediate action of the DMW Secretary to ensure protection of the best interest, welfare, and safety of migrant workers, Gordon added.
For his part, Sen. Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go thanked Villanueva for his sustained defense of SB 2234 and said that, even if certain changes were made, what is important to him is to have the bill passed, calling it a timely “gift to OFWs, to the migrant workers this Christmas.” He said he and President Duterte wanted this measure passed because OFWs are “close to our hearts,” noting Duterte’s recent issuance of the Executive order for the long-awaited setting up of an OFW Hospital in Pampanga.
Families’ anxiety
Senator De la Rosa, meanwhile, noted that the decision of every Filipino to go abroad to work has always been hard. “Like many Filipino families, my own family dealt with separation caused by overseas employment. Three of my siblings went abroad for better jobs,” he said, partly in Filipino.
De la Rosa cited an International Organization for Migration report listing the Philippines as one of the top labor-sending countries in the world. “With the better opportunities offered abroad, our kababayans are not only enticed but are actually left with no choice but to leave their families to work and earn a living,” he added.
He recalled that President Duterte himself had promised, when he was running for the presidency in 2016, the creation of a single department to be home and shelter for OFWs. “I am privileged to be a part of this Congress that fulfills the government’s promise of giving more consideration and care to our hardworking Filipinos abroad,” de la Rosa said.
At the same time, he praised Villanueva, chairman of the Committee on Labor, Employment, and Resource Development, for “spearheading” passage of the bill “and even making it a landmark achievement” of the current 18th Congress. “He is not just a Tesdaman but now we have a new tag for him—‘BMW’, or brother of migrant workers,” De la Rosa added.
“We believe that the creation of a single department solely devoted to promoting the welfare and instituting a higher standard of safety of all overseas Filipinos will indeed harmonize and integrate the functions of the various agencies and offices that will make the delivery of services more accessible and available,” he had said.