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06-09-09 Jinggoy wants "full-scale Oplan Repatriation" for all distressed, stranded OFWs Posted: June 11th, 2009 @ 3:22am  Senate President Pro Tempore Jinggoy Ejercito Estrada today called on the Arroyo administration to implement a full-scale “OPLAN OFW Repatriation” to bring home all overseas Filipino workers who are distressed and stranded abroad. “Some nine million Filipinos – nearly a quarter of our labor force and about ten percent of our population – work in more than 190 countries abroad. These OFWs pour billions of dollars a year into the country’s economy through remittances,” Estrada, chair of the Senate Committee on Labor, Employment and Human Resources Development and the joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Labor and Employment, noted, adding: “But thousands of our migrant workers are in distress – victims of maltreatment, low wages, contract substitution, illegal recruitment, etc, – while others are in hospitals, jails and even in morgues. These distressed and stranded OFWs, as clearly identified by our laws, are in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Dubai, Lebanon, Singapore…they are in almost all OFW destination countries, yet our government has been repatriating only a handful of them periodically, and so the backlog on repatriation piles up.” “It is high time that we executed such an operational plan to fetch all these troubled OFWs abroad because our government is duty-bound – legally and morally – to do no less than that,” he stressed. The senator said such need and action for repatriation are adequately provided under the Migrant Workers and Overseas Filipinos Act of 1995 (Republic Act No. 8042), to wit: Article I: General Policy Statement: Section 1 - Declaration of Policies. - (b) The State shall… provide adequate and timely social, economic and legal services to Filipino migrant workers. (c) … the dignity and fundamental human rights and freedom of the Filipino citizen shall not, at any time, be compromised or violated. (e) … it is imperative that an effective mechanism be instituted to ensure that the rights and interest of distressed overseas Filipinos… in particular, documented or undocumented, are adequately protected and safeguarded. Article II: Definition of Terms: Sec. 2 - Definitions. - (c) … Overseas Filipinos… shall be deemed in distress in cases where they have valid medical, psychological or legal assistance problems… Article XV: Repatriation fund Sec. 15 - … there is hereby created and established an emergency repatriation fund…under the Overseas Workers’ Welfare Administration (OWWA)… initially to consist of one hundred million pesos… Thereafter, such fund shall be provided for in the General Appropriations Act from year to year… Sec. 59 – OWWA shall make representation with the Office of the President for immediate funding in excess of said amount. Sec. 54 - … When a need for repatriation arises and the foreign employer fails to provide for its cost, … the agency shall provide the plane ticket… Sec. 55 - … If the employment agency fails to provide the ticket… OWWA shall advance the costs of repatriation… Sec. 56 - … OWWA… shall undertake the repatriation of workers in cases of war, epidemic, disasters or calamities, natural or man-made, and other similar events… Sec. 57 - … The responsible officer… shall immediately cause the repatriation of underage Filipino migrant workers. Other pertinent laws further state that whenever the OWWA cannot effect a repatriation, the Department of Foreign Affairs shall effect the same through its Assistance to Nationals (ATN) fund. “With these clearly defined provisions, our government must now comply with its duty to effect the repatriation of all these victimized modern heroes,” Estrada said. |
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Copyright © 2008 Senate President Pro Tempore Jinggoy Ejercito Estrada
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