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The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) has not turned a blind eye
on the plight of more than a hundred overseas Filipino workers (OFWs)
who are reportedly stranded in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. In fact, the
stranded OFWs are finally coming home.
“We are making provisions for them all to be
able to come home,” said Undersecretary for Migrant Workers
Affairs Esteban Conejos. “They are being processed by Saudi
immigration officials and we have already provided for their plane
tickets. We are just waiting for the processing to end.”
About $36,000 was already allotted by the DFA
for the return tickets of the undocumented OFWs, while the
Overseas Workers Welfare Administration already made provisions for
the return tickets of the documented workers.
According to Conejos, the fiasco surrounding the
stranded OFWs started with text messages stating that Filipinos who
want to go back immediately to the Philippines should go to Jeddah
at the Al Khandara bridge where a bus from the immigration services
in Jeddah would pick them up.
As a result, 237 Filipinos went to Jeddah to
stay under a bridge in Al Khandara.
“Filipinos from all over Saudi Arabia, who
believed the text message, camped under that bridge. And like the
text message told them, a bus came, however most of them did not
have the proper papers to show the bus drivers and they were not let
on. This prompted them to go to the consul,” Conejos said.
The Filipinos were actually duped by the text
messages —some even by fixers who took money from them— into
thinking that the fast processing in the Jeddah deportation center
would allow them to return home the soonest.
“What they were told about only applies to
those who have overstayed on their Hadji or pilgrimage visas,”
Conejos said.
Of the 237 stranded Filipinos, only 91 were
pilgrims who were immediately repatriated. On January 25, the 38
Filipino women and children who had camped out under the bridge were
also returned home.
-- Katrice R. Jalbuena
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