Arroyo in Dubai job hunt; OFWs warned

UAE also dropping foreign workers, says expert

By Jerome Aning, Christian V. Esguerra
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Posted date: April 13, 2009

MANILA, Philippines—President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is now in Dubai to shop for investments and jobs for Filipinos displaced by the global financial crisis, but a recruitment industry consultant warned that employment opportunities had all but dried up there.

According to Emmanuel Geslani, Dubai has lost its status as a corporate financial hub and many unemployed migrant workers are now finding out just how tough are the laws on debt, immigration and labor in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Geslani aired the warning Sunday, in the course of pointing out that Ms Arroyo’s trip to Dubai to meet with prospective employers of Filipinos did not mean that thousands of jobs were still available there.

“My advice to [Filipinos] is: Don’t go there for nothing so you will not suffer,” Geslani told the Philippine Daily Inquirer on the phone.

He said Filipinos applying for jobs in Dubai and other parts of the UAE should verify from their would-be employers if a working visa or permit would be eventually issued to them when they get there.

Geslani, a 30-year veteran of the recruitment industry, is a former vice chair and three-term director of the Philippine Association of Service Exporters Inc. (PASEI).

His clients include Manila-based recruitment agencies belonging to PASEI, the Federation of Manpower Exporters and the Overseas Performers Association of the Philippines.

Middle East Forum

Ms Arroyo arrived in the UAE from Thailand at 2:20 a.m. Saturday (Manila time). She was ahead of schedule in her four-day, two-nation swing because of the political turmoil in Pattaya, Thailand, that aborted the April 10-12 summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) there.

In its official website, Malacañang said the President was to attend the “Middle East Forum,” an employment and business opportunities summit, in Dubai.

It said the event would gather some “250 private service providers involved in the recruitment and hiring of skilled workers and professionals, plus concerned officials from both sending and receiving countries.”

“The Middle East Forum aims to bring together key players—employers, manpower providers, officials of the Philippines and Gulf Cooperating Countries—to discuss how the Philippines can fill up large-scale job orders in the region within the year,” it said.
Malacañang described the UAE as the workplace of choice of Filipino workers in the Middle East, next only to Saudi Arabia.

It is home to 304,241 documented and 35,040 undocumented Filipino workers, it said.

Of the number, 19.47 percent are considered professionals, 38.25 percent skilled, 27.97 percent semi-skilled, and 14.31 percent unskilled.

Empty malls, lost jobs

But Geslani said: “Ms Arroyo may just be wasting taxpayer money by flying all the way to Dubai as she may find countless half-built buildings with their cranes motionless, empty malls and starving Filipinos who have lost their jobs.”

He cited the case of 120 Filipinos who were initially deployed to the UAE with only visitor visas and who were later terminated before they could get work visas.

Under UAE immigration laws, the Filipinos should have secured work visas or they must leave in order to renew their visitor visas.

Penniless and unable to cope with the high cost of living, the Filipinos were forced to seek shelter at the Philippine Embassy.

Geslani also cited a “horror story” reported by a British daily about a Canadian woman forced to live in a Range Rover for months in the underground garage of one of Dubai’s international hotels. Her husband was reportedly imprisoned for six months for nonpayment of debts.

As a consultant, Geslani advises his clients on the viability of their hiring projects and makes representations with government agencies concerning policies affecting recruiters.

He has contacts with placement firms abroad.

Canceled work visas

Quoting from regional recruitment industry data, Geslani said from 1,500 to 2,000 visas were being canceled in the UAE’s white-collar sector every day.

He said many construction companies in Dubai had temporarily stopped over $500 billion worth of new projects and sent home over 40,000 workers from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The number is expected to rise in the coming months as thousands of foreign workers have begun filing complaints at the UAE labor ministry for unpaid salaries and termination without payment of salaries, according to Geslani.

Since the onset of the crisis, Geslani said about 30,000 white-collar jobs in international and local financial companies had been lost.

He said most of these jobs were held by nationals of the United Kingdom, Germany, Sri Lanka and Egypt.

Expatriates who lose their jobs in Dubai or other Gulf countries have to quickly pack up and leave as employers are supposed to notify the banks of terminations so the banks can demand repayment of loans owed by terminated employees, Geslani said.

Employees who have been told of their termination are given a grace period of two to three months to look for alternative work. However, most companies have stopped recruitment.

Geslani recalled that until October 2008, companies in Dubai and the rest of the UAE were on a hiring spree, with around 650,000 work permits issued to foreigners in 2008. Of that number, 360,000 were issued in Dubai alone.

The population of the UAE in 2008 was 6.4 million, of which 5.5 million were foreigners.

Meetings

Before returning to Manila on Tuesday, Ms Arroyo will meet with the UAE president, Sheik Khalifa Bid Zayed Al Nayan, at the presidential palace in Abu Dhabi and later with members of the Filipino community.

Press Secretary Cerge Remonde said the meeting with the UAE president would seek to “strengthen the diplomatic, economic, and trade relations between the two countries and to secure a better deal for Filipino workers.”

In wrapping up her brief regional trip, Ms Arroyo will bring home memories of her unnerving experience in Thailand, where some 1,000 protesters seeking the ouster of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva stormed the convention center in Pattaya.

Ms Arroyo had to be airlifted from the roof of the Royal Cliff Grand Hotel to escape the protesters.

Remonde, who was part of the official delegation, said Ms Arroyo remained “calm and collected” throughout the experience.

But members of the Philippine delegation had to rush to where Ms Arroyo was, preventing them from getting their luggage from their respective hotel rooms, Remonde said.

He said Ms Arroyo had to designate Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes, a former defense secretary and military chief of staff, as “ground commander” to coordinate the movements of the Philippine delegation.