OFWs Can Use their Remittances More Profitably

This is a continuation of my previous post on the beasts of burden – the OFWs. We look at the current practices, and how we can improve it to bring about a positive bottom line – not just for OFWs but for the overall economic well being of the Philippines as well. Benigno demystifies the myth of OFW remittances contribution to the economy. In his recent GRP piece on OFW contributions he writes:

Read the rest of the article here.

OFWs: Evolving the Beast of Burden into the Tip of the Spear

I was doing a leisurely read on a humdrum topic which has become staple fodder of Pinoy melodrama and revenue – OFWs. It used to be a surreal topic, until I became an overseas Pinoy myself. I faced the same challenges – homesickness, isolation, finding my way around, building new social networks – and was fortunate enough to have mentors who showed me the ropes. From a feeling of guilt if am not making sacrifices for the “common good” to a sense of fulfillment in achieving a personal win. For the first time, I am able to define myself in terms of myself – not what my parents want, not what my cousins, barkada, kapitbahay, masahista, driver, maid, mom’s acquaintances, dad’s acquaintances – not having the entire barrio to tell you what you should do with your life. I, me, myself – on my terms. Oh by golly, the silence is sweet, priceless. From a person expected to conform you are given personal responsibility – no social nets, no kaibigan, kapatid, kamag-anak, koneksyon – you rise and fall on the basis of merit.

Read the rest of the article here.

RP dependence on OFW earnings leads to jobless growth -- recruiter

MANILA, Philippines --Awash with dollars from US$18 billion (more than P821 billion) a year in remittances from overseas Filipino workers a year, the Philippine economy could be now afflicted with the “Dutch disease,” an economic malady that sees the decline of local industries, fuels an overvalued peso, makes exports costly and imports cheap, and results in jobless growth, according to recruiters.

Lito Soriano, executive director of the Federated Association of Manpower Exporters, issued the warning in a recent forum on the strong peso and what must be done on the peso-dollar exchange rate concerns of overseas Filipino workers.

“Ironically for the OFWs who are the ones sending the dollar windfall to their families each month, they and their families are the first victims of the economic malady that was first experienced by the Netherlands,” Soriano said in a statement.

Soriano was referring to the term coined by The Economist in 1977 to describe the decline of the manufacturing sector in the Netherlands following the discovery of a large natural gas field in 1959. This culminated in the world's biggest public-private oil industry partnership in 1963.

The Dutch disease is a concept that purportedly explains the apparent relationship between the increase in exploitation of natural resources and a decline in the manufacturing sector. The theory is that an increase in revenues from natural resources will “de-industrialize” a nation’s economy by raising the exchange rate, which makes the manufacturing sector less competitive and public services entangled with business interests.

The concept has since been applied to other types of economic models. In the case of the Philippines, the increase in revenues comes from the OFWs’ remittances.

Soriano, chair of the LBS Recruitment Solutions, said the bloated dollar supply, not earned with private and government investments, would ten to lure decision makers to squander public funds and go into foreign borrowing sprees, confident the country has enough reserves to pay for the foreign loans.

The recruiter said that one of the “most obvious” symptoms of the Dutch disease has been the continued strengthening of the local peso even when the economy has been “barely” growing.

“When an OFW sends $1, 000 to his family today, it’s equivalent to only P45, 000 at P45 to the dollar exchange rate or P5, 000 less than what they got when the dollar was worth P50 in 1997,” he said.

As a “rule of thumb,” the recruiter added, an OFW would not get a raise while on contract for two to three years

The strong peso fueled by OFW money have further punished both the local industries selling to the domestic market and abroad because their costs were much higher than those from countries not suffering from the Dutch disease, Soriano added.

“The decimation of both the domestic industries and export industries has depleted the manpower pool for highly skilled and professional workers that are in the high-end of the deployment industry,” he explained.

Soriano added that the OFW deployment industry has suffered from a “shallow pool” of highly trained people that resulted in fewer takers and the increasing deployment of factory workers, maids and entertainers.

Citing data from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, Soriano said that of the 7.8 million sent to different parts of the world from the year 2001 to 2008, average yearly deployment was 893, 475 people, but close to half of them (47 percent) were rehired land-based workers plus 24 percent returning seafarers.

Newly hired averaged only 29 percent or less than a third, he said.

In 2007, Soriano said POEA figures revealed that among the first-time OFWs, 121, 715 were factory workers, 107,135 were classified as service workers mostly domestics while only 43,225 were professional and technical workers. Another 20, 000 were sent out as sales workers and clerks.

“In 2007, 74 percent of deployed workers were domestics, service and factory workers. Of all the deployed, only 14 percent were new hires,” he pointed out.

Among nurses, Soriano said, only an average of 10, 000 have been getting nursing jobs abroad each year, a “far cry” from the alleged tens of thousands some public officials claim. Most nurses end up without jobs here.

He said the “most alarming trend” has been the increasing rate of female workers getting jobs overseas. In the past seven years, he said, 64 percent were female against 36 male and most of them were sent as domestic helpers, entertainers and factory hands.

Soriano said the cure for the Dutch disease would be multi-faceted.

“Taipans should invest in permanent jobs like manufacturing and light industries. There should be a more competitive exchange rate as the peso is overvalued by 20 percent resulting in a lower exchange rate for OFWs,” he said.

Soriano said that government should also admit the existence of the economic phenomenon, adding, “The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas is projecting more remittances from OFWs, but how about earnings from other sectors such as the export industry?” - Jerome Aning, Philippine Daily Inquirer, March 14, 2010

Door narrows for foreign workers in Singapore

SINGAPORE — Construction workers from Bangladesh, hotel staff from the Philippines, waitresses from China, shipyard welders from Myanmar, technology professionals from India -- Singapore has them all.

For years the rich but worker-starved city-state, built by mainly Chinese immigrants, had rolled out the welcome mat for foreigners, whose numbers rose drastically during the economic boom from 2004-2007.

But with one in three of the five million people living on the tiny island now a foreigner and citizens complaining about competition for jobs, housing and medical care, the government is taking a fresh look at its open-door policy

With the grumbling getting louder and general elections expected to be called before they are due in 2012, the government has unveiled measures to reduce reliance on foreigners and assure citizens they remain the priority.

"There are social and physical limits to how many more we can absorb," Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam told parliament in February.

He said the government will make it costlier for companies to hire foreigners by raising the levies they must pay for every non-Singaporean or non-resident they hire.

The government also earmarked 5.5 billion Singapore dollars (3.9 billion US) over the next five years to upgrade Singaporean workers' skills to boost their productivity, make them more competitive and raise incomes.

It imposed measures to cool down rising home prices, also blamed on foreigners buying into the property market, and pledged it will further tighten the process of accepting permanent residents and new citizens.

Of Singapore's population of nearly five million last year, 533,200 were permanent residents and 1.25 million were foreigners on employment passes, along with their families, official statistics show.

"I think it is shaping up to be one of the hottest issues in Singapore today," political commentator Seah Chiang Nee told AFP.

Economist Song Seng Wun of CIMB-GK Research said that apart from helping local companies rise up the value chain, the new measures will also address potential election issues.

Singapore's last elections, held in 2006, saw the ruling People's Action Party returned to power for six years, continuing its uninterrupted rule over the island since 1959.

"The government has to be seen doing something in areas that are potential flashpoints," Song said.

Disenchantment over foreign workers gained momentum during a severe economic slump that began in the third quarter of 2008, when trade-reliant Singapore became the first Asian economy to slip into recession.

Drastic job and salary cuts were implemented, affecting many white-collar workers.

In coffee shops, Internet forums, letters to newspapers and sessions with members of parliament, citizens became more vocal about the rapidly growing numbers of foreigners in their ranks.

The most common complaint is that Singaporeans are losing jobs to foreigners who are willing to accept much lower salaries.

"Foreigners are a damn pain in the butt. I seriously wonder if they are here to work or just snatch jobs from our locals," said one posting on the popular online forum sammyboy.com.

"The country is fast becoming an unfamiliar place to many Singaporeans. The sense of national pride is disappearing by the day," said a posting by Nur Muhammad on The Online Citizen.

Seah, who runs the political website www.littlespeck.com, said much of the resentment comes from Singaporeans who have to compete directly with foreign engineers, accountants, hotel managers and IT professionals.

"Most Singaporeans do not feel angry against low-skilled foreign workers... It is more aimed at those who come in as white collar workers and get the jobs that Singaporeans can do," he said.

Citizens have also complained about having to share space in crowded trains with a large number of foreigners, or compete with them for places in government schools and public housing.

Foreign labourers are accused of loitering, spitting in public and leaving litter behind. Another sore point for locals is dealing with waitresses and sales people who can hardly understand English.

Some employers have argued they do not hire Singaporeans for certain jobs because locals are choosy and often lack the natural social and communication skills in service professions like manning hotel front desks.

In some ways, Singapore is a victim of its own success.

A campaign in the 1970s for families to have only two children was so effective that the country is now well below the 60,000 babies needed per year just to naturally replace the resident population.

Efforts to reverse the trend have failed as increasingly affluent couples marry at a later age and opt for just one child or none at all.

Officials, economists and business executives admit that with Singaporeans procreating less, the country will need foreign workers in the long term, while making sure citizens' interests are addressed.

Singapore's founding leader Lee Kuan Yew, who advises the cabinet of his son Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, said in January that "we've grown in the last five years by just importing labour."

"Now, the people feel uncomfortable, there are too many foreigners," Lee said.

"The answer is simple: We check the flow of foreigners, raise your productivity, do the job better, so that instead of two workers, eventually you'll do it with one worker, like the Japanese do." - By Martin Abbugao (AFP), 14 March 2010

16 OFWs barred from leaving

MANILA, Philippines - Operatives of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) at the Zamboanga port recently barred 16 undocumented overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) bound for Malaysia from leaving the country.

BI-Zamboanga alien control officer Sitti Rubiana Lutian said their officers twice foiled attempts by human trafficking syndicates to use the Zamboanga port as exit point to Malaysia.

In a report to Immigration Commissioner Marcelino Libanan, Lutian said 12 of the passengers arrived at the Zamboanga airport last Feb. 22 while four others arrived last Feb. 25 aboard separate flights from Manila.

The passengers proceeded to the Zamboanga seaport and attempted to board the ship M/V Danica Joy 2 bound for Sandakan, Sabah when they were off-loaded, Lutian said.

Lutian said the 16 OFWs hail from Nueva Ecija, Pampanga and Pangasinan. – Helen Flores, (The Philippine Star) Updated March 01, 2010 12:00 AM

Women ‘enrich’ husbands in RP — reports

And they may also elect the country’s next president

MANILA, Philippines—Thanks to their wives, married Filipino men are more financially secure than most bachelors. Today, International Women's Day, is the best time to thank them for it.

But first, some news from the United States.

A recently released report of the Washington, DC-based Pew Research Center shows a growing number of American men married to women whose education and income exceed their own.

From an economic perspective, the report said this trend is contributing to a “gender role reversal” in the gains from marriage. In the past, when fewer wives worked, marriage was a route to financial security for women. Nowadays, it is men who are getting the biggest economic boost from wedded bliss.

The report studied the numbers between 1970 to 2007, when median household income for married men, married women, and unmarried women increased 60%. Unmarried men, on the other hand, increased their income by only 16%.

This trend is also evident in other parts of the world, especially in the Philippines, where women celebrate their economic, political and social achievements.

Like in the US, there are more women attending college in the Philippines. The proportion is highest in graduate programs, according to the National Statistics Office (NSO).

The result is 20% of working women and only 10% of working men have completed college.

In Bar Exams, women have ended the reign of men as topnotchers. Women have also equaled, if not exceeded, the number of men in traditionally male-filled professions such as accounting, engineering, and medicine.

During elections, voters turnout among women surpasses the men. Since 1998, there are more registered female voters than males. These figures suggest that women will play a key role in electing the next Philippine president on May 10, 2010.

The Philippines is, in fact, among the top 10 countries in the world that have bridged the gender gap in labor force participation and wages.

It is the leader in Asia and ahead of most rich countries like the US, Germany, France, Britain and Australia, according to the 2009 Global Gender Gap Report of the Geneva-based World Economic Forum.

Based on the 2009 International Business Report of the US-based accounting and management consultants firm Grant Thornton, Filipino women held 47% of senior management positions in privately-held businesses, the largest figure worldwide.

MasterCard’s 2010 World Wide Index of Women’s Advancement also reported that the Philippines topped 14 Asia-Pacific countries in narrowing the socio-economic gap between males and females.

The trend is the same among Filipinos abroad. More than 60% of the 11 million overseas Filipino workers (OFW) are women. Many of the women face physical or mental risks abroad just to support husbands and children at home.

The Philippine economy relies heavily on the remittances of these OFWs. On average, their remittances are equivalent to 10% of the country’s gross domestic product. This figure was noted by the conservative US think-tank Heritage Foundation in its recently issued 2010 Index of Economic Freedom.

Thanks to the wives, Filipino married men are better off than their single counterparts. (Newsbreak) - Written by Frankie Llaguno, MONDAY, 08 MARCH 2010

No OFW deployment to Guam in 2010—recruiter

MANILA, Philippines—The anticipated deployment of about 20,000 Filipino construction workers to Guam is unlikely this year, a recruitment consultant said Sunday.

Emmanuel Geslani said Japan’s review of the plan to relocate the United States military base from Okinawa to Guam will delay the planned OFW deployment to next year at the earliest.

“Until US President Barrack Obama and Japan’s Prime Minister agree on the Futenma issue all bets are off on Guam at the moment,” he said in a news release.

In the 2006 realignment pact, Washington and Tokyo agreed to move the Futenma Marina Corps Air Station from downtown Futenma in Okinawa to an airfield to be built at Camp Schwab, a more rural part of the island. Once that airfield is built, Futenma would be closed and 8,600 of the 17,000 US Marines stationed on Okinawa would be moved to Guam by 2014, with Japan shouldering more than $6 billion of the estimated $10 billion expense for building accommodations for the US troops.

Geslani said this US-Japan agreement has been the basis of the meetings between the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration and Guam legislators and businessmen over the past three years for the hiring of OFWs.

Recruitment agencies have been pooling manpower for the anticipated variety of construction activities that the Guam move of 35,000 Marines and their dependents would entail. New headquarters, new runways, barracks, hospitals, and housing for dependents were in the drawing board.

However, in late 2009, newly elected Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama stopped the plan, called for a review of the 2006 pact, and assembled a committee to look at all possible alternative locations for Futenma’s operations.

In reaction, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said any changes to the 2006 agreement were unacceptable. Even US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a January speech in Hawaii, “We look to our Japanese allies and friends to follow through on their commitments, including on Futenma.”

“Our OFWs are raring to work in Guam because of the higher wages and benefits that US and Japanese contractors provide. However, they may have to wait until next year after this yawning rift between Tokyo and Washington is patched up,” Geslani said. - INQUIRER.net, March 07, 2010

‘Circular migration’ for OFWs in UK proposed

MANILA, Philippines—The United Kingdom is proposing to allow Filipino skilled workers in the United Kingdom who are applying for UK citizenship to return to their home country without jeopardizing their application, the UK embassy here said in a news release.

The embassy cited a joint publication by the UK Border Agency and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office which contained the plan.

The publication, entitled “International Challenges, International solutions; Managing the movement of people and goods,” published an international action plan to strengthen the UK’s partnerships with agencies of other countries to further improve its migration policies.

“We have proposed a plan to allow the source countries a chance to benefit from its skilled workers through ‘circular migration’ which will basically allow workers applying for citizenship to return to their source country and use their skills and expertise to benefit their source country. That way, they will have a chance to take what they learned while working in the UK and bring back their new skills to benefit their source country before they return to the UK to continue their path to citizenship,” explained James Sharp, the UK Border Agency’s Regional Director for Asia Pacific.

“We want our migration policies to benefit not only the UK but also the source countries, particularly the developing countries such as the Philippines,” he said.

Sharp said some 200,000 to 300,000 Filipinos live in the UK today, many of whom are employed in the health care sector.

“It would be beneficial for the Philippines if [Filipino] nurses and doctors working in the UK would be allowed to go back to the Philippines for a number of years without affecting their application for UK citizenship,” he added. - INQUIRER.net, March 07, 2010

Call to bar Filipino workers from going to Gulf

MANILA // A group of Philippine congressmen and women are calling on the country's government to bar domestic workers from going to the Middle East and Gulf states, claiming they are being treated “as nothing more than modern-day slaves”.

More than one million Filipinos, mostly poorly educated women, work in the Middle East and Gulf states as domestic helpers.

The New York-based rights group Human Rights Watch, in its World Report 2010, said many female domestic workers throughout the region are subjected to unpaid wages, food deprivation, forced confinement, physical or sexual abuse and long working hours.

More than eight million Filipinos live and work in more than 120 countries around the world, many of them as domestics. The Philippine Central Bank reported this month that remittances from January to November last year rose 5.1 per cent over the corresponding period in 2008 to US$15.8 billion (Dh58bn), an amount equivalent to roughly 10 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product.

“Overseas Filipino workers have now become an integral part of the economy,” said Ellene Sana, executive director of the Centre for Migrant Advocacy.

“They are no longer considered as people but as commodities,” she said.

This mass migration of Filipinos, especially female domestic helpers, has become a major concern as there are no internationally accepted standards for protecting them or migrant workers in general.”

Three Filipino politicians recently toured the Middle East and Gulf states on a fact-finding mission to see for themselves the condition of domestic workers and they are in the process of finalising a report to present to Congress. But with elections due in May the report will probably not see the light of day until a new government is sworn in at the end of June.

Luz Ilagan, who represents the women’s group Gabriela in Congress, was on the fact-finding trip. She said the group was primarily concerned with the plight of domestic workers. “These are the most vulnerable and least protected of our overseas workers.

“The stories we were told ranged from sexual and physical abuse to non-payment of wages and long work hours. Basically we were looking at 21st-century slavery.”

She said the group would like to see the government – either the present government of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the president, or whoever takes her place – implement a ban on those employers cited for abuse.

The politicians also urged the government, particularly the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, which is responsible for overseeing the deployment of Filipino workers, to punish agencies involved in illegal recruitment or contributing to the abuse of Filipino domestic workers.

“The problem is not only on the employer’s side, it is on our side as well,” she said.

Mrs Ilagan and her colleagues, the congressmen Carlos Padilla and Rufus Rodriguez, who are all members of the House committee on workers affairs, interviewed 400 Filipino domestics who had run away from their employers and sought refuge in embassies or consulates in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the UAE.

Mr Padilla described how one of the runaways hid inside a rubbish bin while waiting to be rescued by a representative of the Philippine Embassy.

Mrs Ilagan recounted the story of one Filipina who was so desperate she jumped from the second-storey window of her employer’s house and broke her back.

“In another case one woman told how she escaped the home of her abusive employers and was raped by a taxi driver who had picked her up,” Mrs Ilagan said.

Despite the problems the Middle East and Gulf states are consistently at the top of the list of overseas destinations for Filipino workers.

According to the latest figures from the overseas employment agency, 72 per cent of migrant Filipino workers went to Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman in 2008, compared with 65 per cent in 2007. Figures for 2009 are not available. Most were female domestic workers.

In 2006 the Philippine government introduced a series of reforms to better prepare workers for overseas jobs, including upgrading the skills of domestic workers and introducing a minimum salary of $400 a month. “But under a regime which encourages labour export, these reforms only encouraged creative countermeasures from recruiting agencies and prospective employers abroad. Illegal deployment and trafficking, for instance,” Mrs Ilagan said.

She said local Philippine agencies with partners in the Middle East scour the Philippine provinces for recruits they bring abroad without even passing through the employment administration.

“The Philippine government is doing a pitiful job protecting the rights and welfare of Filipino workers, especially in the Middle East,” Garry Martinez, the chairman of Migrante International, said recently. “When OFWs are in trouble, more often than not it is migrant organisations like Migrante who come to their aid.”

Mr Padilla said one of the problems was the lack of any bilateral agreements between the Philippine government and governments in the Middle East and the Gulf protecting the rights of Filipino workers.

From January to September last year, Mr Padilla said, the government repatriated more than 8,000 overseas Filipino workers from around the world.

“One of the basic problems is the deep cultural differences between the Philippines and the Middle East,” Mrs Ilagan said.

“By law all overseas workers should attend seminars before they are deployed abroad, but with 3,000 people leaving this country a day the government agencies responsible can’t cope.

“At the same time, our embassies do not have the money nor the staff to cope with the problems they are having to face every day with runaways.”

What started out as an experiment by Ferdinand Marcos in 1974 to promote Filipino talent overseas has now grown into an integral part of the country’s economy.

“Migration cannot be used as a development strategy,” Ms Sana of the Centre for Migrant Advocacy said. “It becomes an economic question rather than a social issue.”

Karl Wilson, Foreign Correspondent, January 31. 2010 1:33AM UAE / January 30. 2010 9:33PM GMT, http://www.thenational.ae

foreign.desk@thenational.ae

For deported Filipinos, it’s Sabah or bust

ZAMBOANGA CITY—Filipinos deported from Sabah in Malaysia are bent on returning despite the threat of getting arrested again, jailed, humiliated and caned.

Basit Nur, a Muslim religious preacher (tabligh) from this city who had gone to Sabah to work as a carpenter, said being held for almost three months at the Ruma Mera detention center there was more bearable than seeing his family mired in poverty.

The Philippines has a long-standing claim to Sabah, which lies in the northern part of the island of Borneo. Yet an average of 150 to 200 Filipino men, women and children found to be illegally staying there have been deported every week on a regular basis since 2002, according to reports.

And even as the brutal cycle goes on, the Malaysian government pays yearly rent of P70,000 to the heirs of the sultan of Sulu, who continue to lay sovereign or proprietary claim to Sabah.

Speaking in Filipino and Chavacano, Basit Nur, 40, said earning 45 Malaysian ringgit (P450) a day in Sabah was better than trying to peddle his skills in this city where he often faced discrimination.

“They don’t want to hire me because I am a Muslim, and if they hire me, they pay me only P120 to P150 a day,” he told the Philippine Daily Inquirer (parent company of INQUIRER.net).

Asked if he was planning to return to Sabah, Nur said: “I will. Even if I don’t have the money for the processing of my papers here, I will find other ways to return. And I will make sure that I will outsmart the police there.”

He said he did not mind getting arrested again. “Shame can’t be eaten. What’s important is a job to sustain one’s family.”

‘I have to return’

Esmula Arisal, 40, arrived here in Zamboanga City on Saturday after being jailed for three months in Sabah, and said he would not go back to his native Kalinggalang Caluang in Sulu province.

“I will stay here. I will have my working papers processed. I have to return to Sabah,” he said.

A widower, Arisal has established roots in Sabah, where he makes a living selling assorted merchandise. His two children—Hilda, 12, and Midzfar, 2—were born there but are not recognized as Malaysian citizens.

When reminded of the maltreatment he would receive if he got arrested again by Malaysian police, Arisul said: “Why, is the Philippine government offering good jobs to unschooled people like me? Are good wages being offered here?”

But Arisal will leave his children to a relative in Sulu when he returns to Sabah.

“In Sulu, my children can play, go to school. If I get rearrested, they will no longer be with me,” he said.

‘No livelihood here’

In fact, some deportees have already made the trip back.

Sulu-born Maximo Abduraid, also a carpenter in Sabah, managed to return there last week, or three weeks after he was deported to Zamboanga City, according to his nephew, Werning Bilino.

On the phone from Sulu, Bilino said Abduraid had decided against staying in his hometown of Siasi.

“He has no house here,” Bilino said. “Even when I was small, he was already living in Sabah. He’s a carpenter there. Here, he was a fisherman; here, there is no livelihood.”

Eufrosina, who works as a cook in Sabah, said she did not want her children in Palawan province to know that she had been arrested and deported.

“It’s humiliating,” said Eufrosina, who asked that her surname be withheld. “My children know nothing of what has happened to me. They don’t need to know.”

But she stressed that the Filipinos arrested and jailed by Malaysian police—“including children, the elderly, the sick”—were not criminals.

“Our only crime is that we are working there because there is no work to be had here,” she said.

Re-integration program

Officials of the Department of Social Welfare and Development in Western Mindanao said contingency measures were being worked out to address the problem.

Elizabeth Dy, the social welfare specialist in charge of the emergency assistance section, spoke of a plan to launch a “re-integration program” that would focus on the “livelihood, employment, health and education” of the deportees and their dependents.

Dy said the DSWD was in the process of ironing out the program mechanisms.

But Eufrosina said she could not afford to wait.

“I can’t wait for them to make the program a reality,” she said. “My children have to be fed, and their schooling should not be stopped.”

Like most of the other deportees, Eufrosina said she had to return to Sabah.

Standing by RP claim

In Malacañang, Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said the Philippine and Malaysian governments had laid down ground rules for the “orderly” repatriation of Filipinos living or working in Malaysia.

But this does not mean that the Philippines is abandoning its claim to Sabah, he said.

“We have to approach the problems step by step,” Ermita said Wednesday at his regular press conference.

He said the present situation called for cooperation with Malaysian authorities to ensure “humane treatment” for undocumented Filipinos.

Ermita denied that the agreement with Malaysia would jeopardize the claim of the heirs of the sultan of Sulu to Sabah, considering that Congress was in the process of drafting the Philippine baselines.

“Let us address the issue as it is—which is the plight of Filipinos being deported because we have to accept that, indeed, those staying there are ... either undocumented or [holding] spurious documents,” Ermita said.

He said President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had formed a task force headed by Foreign Undersecretary Esteban Conejos, “the purpose being to ensure that the manner of arrest, detention and repatriation is not very abusive, and [to discuss] how we can legalize their stay.”

An estimated 200,000 undocumented Filipinos are working in Malaysia, and 2,800 are in detention for illegal stay, Conejos said.

‘Since time immemorial’

The deportees travel by boat for more than 30 hours to return to the Philippines.

Ermita said Filipinos had been in Sabah “since time immemorial.”

“You can’t disregard the Sabah issue, but we can’t connect all these issues all at once. Otherwise, the goodwill that we have with the other country will be lost,” he said.

Ermita said the dialogue between the Department of Foreign Affairs and its Malaysian counterpart was being conducted “under an atmosphere of common understanding of the need to solve an immediate problem.”

A joint statement issued at the end of the two-day meeting of the 5th RP-Malaysia Working Group on Migrant Workers held at the Heritage Hotel in Pasay City said the two parties had agreed on the humane and orderly conduct of the arrest, detention and repatriation of undocumented Filipinos in Sabah.

The Philippine and Malaysian groups were led by Conejos and Dato Raja Azahar bin Raja Abdul Manap, respectively.

Blood ties

“The migration between our peoples is not only for the purpose of work. Sabah is more than that. In addition to this movement of employment, there’s a vibrant trade between Sabah and the Philippines,” Conejos said, adding:

“They even antedate the establishment of the Republic of the Philippines and the Federation of Malaysia. So we always stress to them, what is happening in Sabah is a complex challenge to us …

“We have also very historic and blood ties with Sabah. We told them we are brothers in the area. We must always look at this not from the simplistic prism of movement for workers, but [as] part of the movement going on for centuries.”

During the meeting, the Philippine and Malaysian groups agreed to:

• Cooperate closely so that there would be minimal adverse impact arising from the actions to be undertaken by the Malaysian government.

• Establish procedures for the humane and orderly conduct of the arrest, detention and repatriation of illegal Filipino migrants, and to endeavor to include measures to improve facilities for those processes.

• Step up efforts to regularize eligible migrants.

• Turn over children unaccompanied by parents to the care of appropriate authorities.

• Ensure that only the medically fit will undertake the trip back to the Philippines.

• Facilitate the documentation of deportees. With a report from Cynthia D. Balana - Julie Alipala, Michael Lim Ubac, Philippine Daily Inquirer, July 24, 2008