Senators on Wednesday moved to ensure adequate standard operating procedures are in place to avoid diplomatic complications when rescuing distressed overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).
“Clearly, there is a need to change the status quo and improve the condition of Filipino workers abroad,” Sen. Emmanuel Joel J. Villanueva, chairman of the Senate Committee on Labor, told reporters after presiding over a joint hearing with the Committee on Foreign Relations and on Economic Affairs tackling reported abuses and deaths of OFWs abroad.
Villanueva added: “This was why our deliberations on these issues are important, because it can help us to get to the root causes of the problem and find solutions to the problems our OFWs face.”
At the outset, Villanueva acknowledged the issue confronting the committee became clearer “because of the recent incidents in Kuwait, particularly the brutal death of [OFW] Joanna Demafelis. It was really shocking and saddening beyond words.”
He lamented that OFWs “still have to make a choice between abuse and unemployment,” citing reports reaching his committee that recorded no less than 185 cases of deaths in Kuwait between 2016 and 2017.
The senator said it was made clear to the Senators at the hearing that the government should promptly address the situation of OFWs abroad.
“Many continue to take a chance on illegal recruiters. OFWs resort to posing as tourists just to skirt regulations. There are recruiters who transfer OFWs from one employer to another, making them vulnerable to abuse,” he said in Filipino, citing his committee’s final findings at the Senate hearing, adding: “Clearly, our OFWs need help.”
Interviewed after the hearing, Villanueva listed “several needs” that, he said, should be promptly addressed.
“We need an intensified training for household workers. We need to give them skills to at least minimize cases of runaways. We even need to check the veracity of NCs [national certification] of our 262,000 NC holders. We need to look at the imposition of exorbitant fees for medical exam, visa stamping, among others. We may need to put up performance bond for employers and require the training of foreign employers. We need to revisit all existing bilateral agreements, since many of these agreements are already outdated,” he said.
“We also need to monitor and confirm if Kuwait is deemed fully compliant as required by Republic Act (RA) 10022. We need to ensure that accountability when our workers are abused is shared among foreign recruitment agency, local recruitment agency and even foreign employers. We need to ensure that our protocols—especially in rescuing OFWs in distress—are being followed. We also need a database of undocumented or abused Filipino workers and, perhaps; we can tap our centers or Polos [Philippine Overseas Labor
Offices] to gather information about undocumented workers. We need information sharing among all agencies, we need to collaborate and convene the interagency group,” Villanueva added.
Above all, Villanueva said, “It seems we just need to implement our existing laws which have been in place for 23 years, specifically Section 20 of RA 8042, which
requires the establishment of a shared government information system for migration.”
Image credits: Nonie Reyes