Filipino Expats Qatar

OFWs heighten protests vs new POEA rules

http://globalnation .inquirer. net/news/ breakingnews/ view/20080202- 116418/OFWs- heighten- protests- vs-new-POEA- rules
By Jerome Aning
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 18:19:00 02/02/2008

MANILA, Philippines -- Groups representing overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in the Middle East, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Italy are in an uproar over new regulations made by the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) that, among other things, require would-be employers to put up thousands of dollars in bonds for each worker.

Migrante-Middle East and the United Filipinos in Hong Kong both said the rules put forth by POEA Memorandum Circular 4 have led to a virtual ban on direct hiring, endangering the jobs of thousands of OFWs around the world.

"We believe the circular translates to the deregulation of the Philippine labor export industry and relieves the government of its responsibility for protection and services to their nationals abroad," Migrante-Middle East regional coordinator John Monterona said in a statement.

In the past days, OFWs, mostly professionals, have been sending embassies and the Philippine Overseas Labor Offices as well as media offices here, the Inquirer included, angry complaints via e-mail about the new direct hiring rule.

A new circular requires foreign employers who want to hire Filipinos directly not only to have their applications screened by Philippine embassies or labor attaches but also to put up performance bonds of $3,000 and repatriation bonds of $5,000 dollars for each worker they hire.

The POEA claims the bonds would guarantee payment of the workers salaries and repatriation in case of death, respectively.

Monterona urged Philippine embassies in the Middle East to follow what the Philippine Embassy in Singapore did when it suspended last January 30 the implementation of the circular "until further notice."

In Manila, the group's umbrella organization, Migrante International, said it will be expanding a petition campaign launched by its Middle East chapter and will also hold a series of protest actions here and abroad against the circular.

Migrante chairwoman Connie Bragas-Regalado said that the circular "exposes the government as a ruthless thug whose message is that all activities in its labor exportation alley must fall under its 'protection racket.'"

"Although the Arroyo administration is sure to justify these bonds as insurance for the welfare of the OFW, it is clearly nothing but 'grease money' in that foreign employers will only be allowed to recruit if they fork out the necessary funds," she added in an e-mailed statement.

Regalado said the reality is that employers would ultimately extract their recruitment costs from the OFWs themselves -- either through their maximum exploitation or through direct deductions from their salary.

Instead of over-regulating direct hiring, Migrante said the government should implement effective mechanisms that will curb, if not finally stamp out, overcharging and other malpractices of recruitment agencies.

For example, OFWs in Taiwan complain that even when they are rehired or return to work from a vacation home, they are treated as new hires and made to pay the same placement fees again as when they first applied for work on the island.

Migrante-Middle East, which groups together OFW associations in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait, said the circular would result in loss of jobs and employment opportunities, put Filipino workers under the control of recruitment agencies, and make them vulnerable to overcharging and other malpractices of unscrupulous recruitment agencies.