Duterte meets maltreated OFW here
MANILA -- President Rodrigo Duterte met the abused overseas Filipino worker (OFW) from Saudi Arabia in his home province in Davao City yesterday.
Pahima Alagasi, the Filipina domestic helper who was scalded by her employer's mother in Saudi Arabia in 2014, was presented before the President yesterday.
The meeting between Duterte and Alagasi was not open for media coverage.
In May 2014, Alagasi suffered severe burns after the mother of her employer doused her back with boiling water.
The Philippine Embassy to Saudi Arabia took custody of Alagasi and let her stay at the Bahay Kalinga shelter, following the reported physical abuse.
The maltreated migrant worker returned to Manila on Friday, April 13, from Riyadh.
Alagasi is just one of the OFWs who experienced inhumane treatment in the Middle East.
Duterte was prompted to impose a total deployment ban of OFWs to Kuwait, following the gruesome death of Filipina maid Joanna Demafelis, whose body was found frozen in her employers' abandoned apartment in the Arab nation's Al Shaab district.
The President has repeatedly maintained that he would not allow any OFWs to endure violence from their employers.
"Every abuse committed against an OFW is an affront against us as a sovereign nation... Do not give us back a battered worker or a mutilated corpse," Duterte said in a speech delivered on February 9.
"We do not intend to offend any government or anyone, but if ban is what is needed, then let it be so... Son of a b **** , I cannot stomach this. It is totally, totally unacceptable to me," he added. (SunStar Philippines)