Cayetano proposes agency for OFWs

A bill seeking the creation of a single department for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) called the Department of Foreign Employment (DOFE) was filed in the Senate on Friday.

Under Senate Bill No. 1435, Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano wants an agency established to serve as a channel to address all issues and grievances of OFWs, including the promotion of their full and just employment and the mitigation of social costs back home.

It also proposes to create a P1-billion OFW Distress and Assistance Fund to provide financial support for OFWs in distress including repatriation and provisions for life-saving funds in times of great emergency and training and livelihood loans for returning OFWs.

The proposed department, which will be headed by a Cabinet Secretary, will be the primary policy, programming, coordinating, and administrative entity of the executive branch, providing assistance to OFWs in the field of overseas labor and employment.

The bill was filed several weeks after President Rodrigo Duterte announced during his state visit in Saudi Arabia that a department for OFWs is now in the works, but jurisdiction on its creation lies with Congress.

Cayetano, a staunch supporter of Duterte, said OFWs often fall victim to illegal recruitment; employer abuse; inadequate benefits; inefficient and ineffective delivery of services; and the lack of representation in the agencies that are supposed to protect and promote their rights.

Citing various reports, he said around two million Filipinos are driven to leave the country due to poverty and joblessness at home.

Senator Cynthia Villar, chair of the Senate Committee on Social Justice, Welfare and Rural Development, has repeatedly expressed her desire to prioritize the creation of the department for OFWs, the Department of Migration and Development.

Last June 2016, Villar filed Senate Bill No. 146 or the “Department of Migration and Development Act of 2016,” which seeks to create a department that will recommend and implement the government’s policies, plans and programs for the promotion of protection, safety, development, support, of and for Filipinos overseas and their families left behind.

Villar’s measure remains in the committee level.