MANILA, Philippines -- Senate President Manuel Villar has brought home a seven-month-old baby, his mother, two senior citizens, two teenagers, and 18 other overseas Filipino workers who were maltreated, abused, unpaid in Amman, Jordan.Asked how he reacted to accusations that he was using the OFWs for political purposes, Villar said: "Parati namang nandyan yan [The intrigues are always there]. But remember that the problems of the OFWs are real and I try to do something about it." Villar, who left in the middle of a political storm in the Senate over the so-called insertions in the 2008 budget, was asked at the airport if he was escaping from the issue when he went to Jordan. "Di naman titigil yan kahit wala ako [It will not stop because I'm away]," he said, adding that he had an appointment with his counterpart, Jordanian Senate President Zeid Rifai, that he didn't want to cancel. He thanked Rifai for the enactment of the law that expanded the coverage of Jordan's Labor Law to include migrant workers and agricultural workers. On the problems of the OFWs, Villar admitted, "Medyo mabigat sa bulsa
[It's expensive] and palliative," but they are not insurmountable. Villar said one of the solutions would be to correct to an imbalance of resource allocation in terms of Philippine posts abroad. He said posts with more problems should have more people and resources. Villar recognized that the problem was not simply Jordan's. He said the problems in the Philippines would start and end with funding, implementation, and focus. He said laws, particularly on the issuances of birth certificates and passports containing fake information, must be enforced properly. Villar, who stopped by Bahrain, also saw a similar situation in the Bahay Kalinga there, and plans to help facilitate the repatriation of overstaying OFWs. Nasria Abdulsamad, 23, from Cotabato City, arrived in Manila with her son Ivan, who was conceived in the Philippines but born in Jordan. Although pregnant women are disallowed from leaving for work abroad, Abdulsamad left without passing through regular channels and did not undergo medical checkup. Pedro Sandoval, 67, from Bulacan, has been working in Jordan for almost 30 years since 1979, but has not been able to regularize his stay and work there as a mason. Fe Padua, 60, from Pasay, left for Jordan with a fake passport, which indicated that she was 44. Baiqueen Guiapal and Linda Manasal, both 16 and from Cotabato, had regular passports which indicated that they were more than 20. Their birth certificates, the basis for the issuance of passports, contained false information about their birth dates. The 18 others whose air fares were shouldered by Villar are: Lorna Almanzor, 28, from Nueva Vizcaya; Bebina Bakunda, 35, from Basilan; Norhuda Balayman; Cherry Batulan, 25, from Cotabato City; Rosalie Cabrera, 33, from Mindanao; Gloria Dela Cruz, 26, from Cagayan Valley; Norhaya Kamanga, 22, from Maguindanao; Wilma Maneja, from Isabela;
Samina Mensag, 20, from Maguindanao; Alma Nobleza, 24, from Antique;
Digna Ramos, 37, from Isabela; Alma Domingo Rifani, 29, from Isabela;
Leah Jen Raul; Johaira Salendab, 27, from Cavite; Andrea Santocildes,
27, from Iloilo City; and Lorna Zoleta, 27, from Quezon. In Amman, Philippine Ambassador Julius Torres said Villar's efforts have helped decongest the POLO or the embassy of OFWs, as well as get media and official attention on the problem. There are an estimated 25,000 to 30,000 OFWs in Jordan. Since the deployment ban on household service workers was imposed January this year, there have been some 4,000 who have circumvented it and entered Jordan as tourists only to work as household service workers. |
