Appoint more social welfare attachés, government asked

More social welfare attaché positions should be opened abroad so that the government can better address the plight of distressed or abused overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), Sen. Sonny Angara said in a statement on Thursday.

There are currently 12 positions for social welfare attachés based on Republic Act No. 11299, which created the Office for Social Welfare Attaches this year.

But he has asked his staff to study the possibility of increasing the number of authorized posts to 30, Angara said.

“Clearly, the scaling up of the deployment of these important frontline personnel has long been delayed. The attaché-to-OFWs ratio is dismally low. We have to reverse the trend,” he added.

The Department of Social Welfare and Development has only filled up seven of the 12 posts, the senator said, adding that the remaining five posts should be filled posthaste.

The seven active posts are in Malaysia-Brunei, Jeddah, Riyadh, Kuwait, Hong Kong, Qatar and Dubai, while the five vacant posts are in Jordan, Lebanon, South Korea, Italy and the United Arab Emirates.