OFWs: Our new heroes or milking cows?

My article last Saturday regarding the ban on overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) intending to work in countries without any bilateral arrangements to protect these workers have boomeranged on the Philippine Overseas Employment Agency (POEA). People are now asking the Philippine government why they are calling the OFWs our new heroes, yet government bureaucrats especially those syndicates in the airport squeeze them dry of their money by escorting them out of the country and to jobs abroad despite the ban. I have two emailed letters which I’m reprinting here.

“Dear Mr. Avila, I am an OFW affected by a deployment ban imposed by POEA since May for Yemen-based OFWs. I have been sending letters to POEA, DOLE, Philippine Embassy in Riyadh, DFA, DFA-OUMWA, and to newspapers in the hope that our plight will be looked upon. I scour most broadsheet opinion writers to check if anyone is ever interested in this issue.

“I have read your article today and glad you have mentioned this. And by sending this file, I was hoping you could tackle this in one of your columns. I thought this letter can see print in any broadsheet. But such does not have a page reserved or I could say, ‘not entertained’. I believe you will.

“For what I have read in many of your columns, you, I could say, can call a spade a spade; not biased, not GMA hater or lover, and certainly does not have an agenda fronted column. I will be very glad to hear from you. Many of the feelers and letters I have sent did not receive any reply except the one from Riyadh Embassy saying something like “Message receive, best regards”. Hope fades when unemployment is in the horizon. God bless.” Edward Garcia, electrical engineer, SEPOC-Yemen [email protected].

Thank you Mr. Garcia for your comments. He attached a three-page article entitled “Philippine Prison”, alas I do not have enough space for that because it would take at least three columns if I put that here. But the meat of that article is simply, OFWs banned to work outside the country are stuck in here, no different from being inside a prison, and I fully agree with Mr. Garcia’s comments that OFWs are imprisoned here at home.

The problem of course is most of our OFWs especially women are more often than not victims of trafficking, which is also my pet peeve. Somehow the POEA must look for solutions to this problem. But then again, I have no doubt that men like Mr. Garcia are not being trafficked so why ban them from leaving the country to find work there? Here’s another emailed comment to that article last Saturday.

“Dear Bobit, POEA actually is the one giving the OFWs a big headache. In the early ’50s when I left for work abroad I never had any problems, documentary or regulatory. All I needed was my passport, Seaman’s Certificate, vaccination booklet and of course my ticket… No contract of employment but never had problems with the foreign employer. Salaries were standard, working conditions and benefits according to international shipping practices… and most of all no “lagay” for either departure or contract processing.

“When NSB and POEA came into the picture… the “lagay” system, the contract processing and the departure regulations became standard operational procedures. Now it appears that our “Bagong Bayani” (sic) should be called the “New Milking Cows”, not only by the government regulating agencies but also their brothers in the profession who are either screwing for seamen or recruitment for land-based workers?

“By the way, I prefer to use “Seaman” because I studied and practiced “Seamanship” not Seafarership as the IMO prefers. May your advocacies be successful and as the Vulcan’s greet “May you live long and prosper.” MB Cuazon. Again thanks to the many OFWs who emailed their comments on that story. I’m sorry I cannot reprint all the letters I got, especially the long ones; but I always respond to their emails to me.

Again I would like to reiterate that what is happening in our country today is very tragic especially to OFWs who are only looking for a job. I recall a columnist from Manila once complained in his column about the “Brain Drain” happening in our country. Obviously that fellow did not realize (or maybe he did) that in the ’60s to the ’80s Imperial Manila “brain drained” the rest of the Philippines. The brightest, the smartest and the most brilliant minds of Cebu, Davao, Cagayan de Oro, Baguio, Vigan, Tacloban and the rest had no chance of getting good well-paying jobs in their respective localities. Hence they were lured or “brain drained” to Manila.

But today, Manila is not good enough for anyone seeking jobs abroad. Filipinos would rather go to Dubai, Qatar, Lebanon, the US, UK or Europe for those good jobs. So why should the government stop them from leaving our country to seek those jobs? As Mr. Cuazon said, OFWs are not new heroes; they are merely the milking cows of the government bureaucrats. So -P-Noy when will you crack the whip on this form of corruption huh?

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For email responses to this article, write to [email protected] or [email protected]. His columns can be accessed through www.philstar.com