
MANILA – Some 200 Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) in Riyadh who survived the two-month lockdown due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic by scavenging, doing odd jobs, selling their cellphones, and pawning their passports will finally be sent home.
According to Atty. Hans Leo Cacdac, administrator of the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA), their Philippine Overseas Labor Office (POLO) in Riyadh will immediately send food supplies to the villa where the OFWs are quartered and to attend to their documents to return to the country. They all work in an aluminum factory in Riyadh which is still closed due to the pandemic.
Cacdac said during a live radio-TV interview on June 18 that, “Napatawag na namin ang kanilang recruitment agency at ang itong agency ay pananagutin natin at idinulog na natin sa POEA sa kawalang action ng kanilang ahensya. Kase ang solusyon dito ay ang agaran nilang pag-uwi, at ang kanilang repatriation ay ating ipaayos dahil may mga repatriation effort sa ngayon at isama na natin sila sa repatriation.”
(We have already called their recruitment agency and we will make them accountable, and we’ve reported the issue to the POEA to explain their inaction. The solution here is for them to go home immediately and we will prepare for their repatriation because there are repatriation efforts going on now and we will include them.)
One of the workers, Leyland Morales, not his real name, said that aside from them there are other 200 OFWs in another villa who are suffering from the same fate. “Pagkatapos ng lockdown, ay hindi na kami nakakapasok po. Kailangan po namin ng pera sa pang-araw-araw na gastos. Ang karamihan namin dito ay nabenta na ang mga cellphone at dumating na po ang punto na pati ang passport ay naisangla na para panggastos namin dito hanggang sa nangalakal na po kami para masuportahan ang araw-araw namin na pagkain.”
(We have no work after the lockdown. We want money for our daily needs. Many of us here have sold their cellphones and some have pawned their passport just to have money to sustain. And there are some who scavenge the garbage just to have something to eat.)
Cacdac promised to make their recruitment agency accountable for not doing anything of the situation of the affected workers and to mobilize the POLO office in Riyadh, which was temporarily closed also because some of their officers and staff were infected with Covid, to help them in their daily needs until such time that they will be repatriated back home.