Don’t go to Syria, DOLE appeals to OFWs

Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz

Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz on Thursday appealed anew to Filipinos intending to work overseas to consider not going to Syria because of the continuing civil unrest in that country.

This followed a report from labor attache Angel Borja in the Syrian capital of Damascus stating that illegally recruited and trafficked Filipino women continue to arrive in the strife-torn Middle Eastern country despite the deployment ban, “in effect replacing those being mandatorily repatriated by the Philippine government.”

“I urge our OFWs who intend to go to Syria not to, particularly if the part of the country they are supposed to work in is engulfed in civil strife,” Baldoz said in a statement.

“If you remain in the country, the government could better protect you. It will also minimize the social cost of being away from your family and from your homeland and eliminate other possible expenses needed to safely bring you home if you are caught in distress situation,” she added.

Stay put

Baldoz told the OFWs who have returned to the Philippines from Syria to stay put, claiming that there are jobs and other nonwage employment opportunities for them in the country, where the pay could be even greater than their salaries as domestic service workers in Syria.

She said the ongoing National Reintegration Program provides returning OFWs with the necessary assistance to ease their return to the country. Under the program, returning OFWs can avail of a low-interest, collateral-free loan offered under the P2-billion OFW Reintegration Loan Fund, from a low of P500,000 to a maximum of P2 million for new or existing businesses.

Start-up capital

There is also the Balik-Pinay, Balik Hanapbuhay Program for distressed women OFWs, which provides a P10,000 livelihood/business development assistance to returning women OFWs.

The P10,000 is meant to be the start-up capital for any kind of livelihood undertaking, which could be a trading or general merchandise sales/dealership, neighborhood store, agri-business, food service, services, e-load station, and production or manufacturing.

Baldoz also said the repatriation of OFWs from Syria is continuing, with the repatriation of 261 OFWs being finalized, and that of  447 being negotiated by the government with their Syrian employers.

Citing Borja’s report, Baldoz said that a total of 362 OFWs have already been repatriated since the government declared an alert level 3 crisis status for Syria on Aug. 17, 2011. Of this number, only 37 were documented or regular workers.

On December 22, the Department of Foreign Affairs raised the alert level in Syria to alert level 4, requiring mandatory repatriation.

Baldoz said that 1,323 OFWs seeking repatriation have registered with the Philippine Embassy in Syria, including 133 documented workers.

Cost of repatriation

But she said that despite the intensified efforts of the embassy and labor officials to inform the OFWs of the government offer of mandatory repatriation, the reception has been “timid.”

She said the funding for the mandatory repatriation is being drawn from the Assistance to Nationals Standby Fund of the DFA. The deployment cost refund to the OFWs’ Syrian employers ranges between $2,500 to $3,000 per OFW, the iqama (residency permit) and other administrative penalties are placed at $1,000 and airfare at $600 per person.

The Philippine Embassy in Syria has estimated that there are 14,927 OFWs in Syria, but only 1,422 of them are documented, according to the report from Borja of the Philippine Overseas Labor Office in Damascus.

From March to Dec. 27, 2011, 434 OFWs have were repatriated, while 148 more OFWs are currently being at the Filipino Workers Resource Center.

Citing the same report, Baldoz said that except for the cities of Homs, Idlib and Dei Ezzor where violent clashes are raging between Syrian forces and protesters, the rest of Syria has been largely untouched by the unrest as the Syrian regime remains intact and in control. Most of the OFWs are located in Damascus and Aleppo.