DMW seeks budget increase amid global tensions
MANILA, Philippines — Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) Secretary Hans Leo Cacdac appealed for additional funding for 2027, citing ongoing global tensions and the need to prepare for their potential impact on overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).
Cacdac made the appeal during the DMW and Overseas Workers Welfare Administration’s (OWWA) budget hearing before the Senate finance subcommittee.
“I don’t want to name any other countries but the political insecurity projections are not entirely optimistic to say the least, so we have to be ready and not just for the Middle East,” Cacdac told Sen. Joel Villanueva, who will defend the DMW’s budget in the plenary.
The DMW and OWWA jointly requested P37 billion for 2027, but the Department of Budget and Management reduced this to P11.62 billion, Cacdac said.
Under the National Expenditure Program, P7.3 billion is allocated to the DMW and P4.3 billion to OWWA.
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With their requested budget cut by 70 percent, the agencies appealed to the Senate panel for an additional P4 billion.
Of the additional amount, P1 billion would go to the DMW’s Agarang Kalinga at Saklolo para sa mga OFWs na Nangangailangan (Aksyon) Fund, which assists OFWs in crises.
When tensions between Iran, the United States, and Israel erupted in March, the agencies repatriated around 12,000 OFWs from the Middle East and helped another 20,000 secure accommodations abroad after they declined to return to the Philippines.
Both agencies exhausted their emergency funds during the period and received another P5 billion in supplemental funding.
Cacdac said the number of OFWs needing repatriation could exceed 12,000 if tensions abroad escalate.
“I don’t want to present a doomsday scenario, but it’s always good to be ready, in case there will be more than 12 thousand persons whom we will have to repatriate. Because in that situation, when we repatriated 12,000 persons and assisted 20,000 who were given shelter abroad and didn’t return, our budget was exhausted,” Cacdac said.
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OWWA Administrator Patricia Yvonne Caunan said the agency’s emergency repatriation fund (ERF) for 2027, which stands at P977 million, would last less than five months at its current rate of utilization.
“At the rate of utilization or obligation of OWWA right now of P206 million of the ERF every month, next year if [we’re given] only P900 plus million [it will be gone in] about 4.7 months,” Caunan said.
She also said the agencies would have to seek another supplemental budget if international tensions spike further next year. /mcm
