By Vanne Elaine Terrazola
Senator Cynthia Villar on Saturday said the Philippines should reduce the number of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) being deployed to Kuwait until authorities have put up more effective measures to protect them from abuse.
Sen. Cynthia Villar
(Senate of the Philippines / MANILA BULLETIN)
Villar suggested this as she joined lawmakers in condemning the death of Filipina domestic worker Jeanalyn Padernal Villavende in the hands of her female employer in Kuwait last December.
The reported killing of Villavende prompted the Philippine government to implement a partial deployment ban of newly-hired OFWs to the Gulf state.
" DOLE (Department of Labor and Employment), through the POEA (Philippine Overseas Employment Administration), should maintain the deployment ban until sufficient reforms are in place to ensure the safety, honor, and dignity of our OFWs in Kuwait," Villar said in a statement.
"Let us scale down the deployment of domestic workers to the Middle East until such time that we are able to put in place a more effective monitoring system onsite. Because this is a business, recruitment agencies will accept job orders for domestic workers that may already be beyond their capacity to monitor. This is one aspect of overseas employment that deserves our serious attention," she appealed.
According to the DOLE, Villavende was beaten "black and blue" by her employer and was already dead when she was brought to the hospital last month. She had reported the employer's maltreatment and underpayment to her recruitment agency as early as September, to no avail.
Villar said the investigation of Villavende's case should include the failure of her local agency and its foreign counterpart to closely monitor her working and living conditions.
"Based on news reports, the OFW had already been complaining to her local agency of contract violations a month after her deployment to Kuwait. Were these complaints ever acted upon?" Villar asked.
The senator also called on the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) to dispatch the "best legal team" to make sure that justice will be served to Villavende's family.
Meanwhile, she said the DOLE, as well as the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the Department of Agriculture (DA), could look into alternative livelihood and local employment opportunities for workers that will be affected by the deployment ban to Kuwait.
"So that they no longer feel compelled to leave the country for the Middle East as domestic workers. Perhaps, their husbands or even the women themselves can be trained to handle basic construction work because there is a huge shortage of skilled workers in the construction field," Villar proposed.
Villavende's death was seen as a breach of the Philippines and Kuwait's 2018 agreement to protect OFWs, which was signed following the gruesome killing of household worker Joana Demafelis, whose body was kept in a freezer by her employers for nearly two years.