A
Foreign Affairs executive bared that Filipino workers
going abroad through informal channels and encounter
problems are causing financial ills for the government.
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Cresente
Relacion, executive director of the Office Undersecretary
for Migrant Workers Affairs, a Department of Foreign
Affairs adjunct, said his unit has been experiencing
budget deficits for the past three years because of
increased repatriation.
Relacion said these workers are mostly undocumented
or acquired jobs abroad without passing through government
agencies processing overseas deployment.
The Department is experiencing a deficit because the
Overseas Workers Welfare Administration only takes
care of documented workers, according to Relacion.
The embassies and the consular offices of the Philippines
abroad, however, have to be open for every Filipino
in need of assistance abroad, documented or not, he
explained. Because of this, Relacion said the department
dips into its Assistance to Nationals (ATN) budget
as well as in its Legal Assistance Fund (LAF).
He said they have asked Congress to approve the increase
of its ATN budget to P100 million from P51 million
and P30 million from P15 million for its LAF.
The ATN, Relacion said, is used to address the needs
of overseas Filipinos in distress. It covers repatriation,
medical expenses, migration fees for overstaying Filipinos
and basic necessities for those caught in emergencies
or are detained.
Relacion also said the department uses this fund to
provide consular services such as dispatches, attendance
of court hearings, payment of translation fees and
financial assistance to Filipinos facing legal cases
abroad.
The Legal Assistance Fund, meanwhile, covers the legal
expenses of overseas Filipino workers in litigation.
These expenses, Relacion said, include court fees
and lawyers’ fees. The fund does not cover payment
of blood money or compensation paid to the family
of a murdered person.
Relacion said most of the money goes to assisting
undocumented Filipino workers abroad since 85 to 95
percent of those who get into trouble did not pass
through formal channels.
Most of these Filipinos, Relacion added, are in the
Middle East, China, and Malaysia.
“The DFA is only the receiving point of the
problems. Many OFWs continue to use tourist visas
or go to unscrupulous agencies,” Relacion said.
Because of the general right to travel, international
migration has had problems “recognizing Filipinos
posing as tourists,” he added.
Adventurism
RELACION said over the past three years, the department
has witnessed an increase in the number of repatriation
cases involving Filipinos.
The increase he linked to the proportional upward
spike in cases of abductions and wars as well as the
provision of amnesty to undocumented workers in Saudi
Arabia, Malaysia and Kuwait.
He said the increase was felt after 2004 when the
ATN still posted a P5 million surplus from an P8 million
surplus in 2003.
However, by 2005, Relacion said they overshot by P17
million the ATN budget to P69 million. He said supplemental
budgets for 2006 and 2007 were already requested from
the national government.
But Relacion fears the funds won’t cover the
cases the foreign affairs department is handling currently.
He said the DFA is handling 28 death penalty cases:
nine in Saudi Arabia, ten in Malaysia, four in Kuwait,
three in China, one in Brunei, and one in the United
Sates.
He said that in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia alone,
lawyers charge up to US$100,000 for death row cases.
Non-capital offenses allow lawyers to charge up to
US$3,500 in fees.
Embassies and consulates, especially in the Middle
East, have to hire legal assistance at the earliest
stage of the case, he added.
“We have to assess as early as possible if we
have to get a lawyer [for the] lower court or [for
the] upper court,” Relacion explained.
Lower court hearings are usually more expensive, he
noted.
Most Filipinos in Middle East, he said, are in death
row for murder, while those in China and Malaysia
are involved in drug cases. Filipinos, he said, are
also getting involved in trafficking in Kuala Lumpur.
Data from Relacion’s office reveal the number
of Filipinos repatriated home have been increasing
since 2003.
From January to August this year alone, some 18,753
Filipinos were flown home compared to the full-year
number of 17,889 last year, 3,775 two years ago, 6,890
in 2004, and 6,114 a year before.
This means some 74 Filipinos were being repatriated
every day for the first quarter of this year compared
to 50 a day last year. The nine-month figure has even
exceeded by eight the number of Filipinos repatriated
if last year’s figure were compared to the period.
Despite these, Relacion said the figure could go higher
because of the difficulty in keeping track of undocumented
Filipino workers.
“A Filipino should not go into adventurism.
They should respect the laws of the country,”
he said.
- OFW Journalism Consortium |
