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By Nora O. Gamolo, OFW Times
Editor
Hundreds of migrant workers,
their families and advocates on Monday commemorated the 13th death
anniversary of Flor Contemplacion, a Filipina domestic hanged in
1995 in Singapore allegedly for killing Delia Maga—a compatriot,
friend and fellow domestic.
The circumstances behind Maga’s
death were suspicious, and Contemplacion was charged for her murder
based on circumstantial evidence. Their killings—one a legal
execution of a convict, and the other, a homicide—dramatize the
plight of unprotected migrant workers all over the world, especially
woman migrant workers.
The marchers were led by Migrante
International, which campaigned to save Contemplacion. The
organization with many chapters abroad monitored OFWs in different
jails, and came up with a collective number of 4,775 OFWs in jail in
different countries from January 2006 to January 2008. Five hundred
of these were women.
In Jeddah alone, some 250 OFWs
are stranded there to date, according to Migrante. Many are victims
of illegal recruiters and are resisting to be repatriated in the
regular channels lest they be banned from returning. They included
20 women now based in a shelter run by the Philippine consulate
there. The stranded reportedly included some children of these
women.
The lack of protection of migrant
workers, especially when working in private households, is one of
the sad facts of labor migration. Yet, this social sector alone has
saved the day for the country’s economy in terms of generating
more than $14 billion in 2007.
Jobs abroad sustain the
Philippine economy. The number of able-bodied, but jobless,
Filipinos would have soared by nearly 50 percent in 2007 if not for
the overseas employment of a large segment of the national labor
force, according to the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP).
Had the Philippines completely
stopped sending workers overseas, Trade Union spokesman Alex Aguilar
said the country’s unemployment rate would have surged as high as
9.3 percent in 2007.
No wonder that Filipinos keep on
looking for jobs outside the country. Some 1,073,402 Filipino
workers were deployed abroad in 2007, according to the Philippine
Overseas Employment Administration. This was roughly the same number
as the 1,062,567 who left for overseas jobs in 2006.
Assuming all those who left to
work abroad stayed home instead, and assuming further that they did
not find any gainful employment here, then the ranks of wholly
unemployed Filipinos would have ballooned to 3,335,102, Aguilar
said.
Labor migration has become
feminized, meaning more and more women are leaving the country to
seek jobs abroad, compared to men. Male OFWs accounted for 49.6
percent or roughly 751,000 of the total OFWs in 2006. There was also
an increase of 12.6 percent from the estimated 667,000 OFWs in 2005.
Of the 1.52 million OFWs in 2006,
female OFWs were estimated at 764,000 (50.4 percent), or an increase
of 15.8 percent from the 660,000 estimated female OFWs in 2005.
Female OFWs were generally
younger than males. Around 43.5 percent of female OFWs were aged 15
to 29 years, while male OFWs were evenly distributed among the age
groups.
There is a steady trend of
younger female OFWs because in 2005, about 44 percent of the total
female OFWs also belonged to the 15 to 29 age group, according to
the National Statistics Office.
Overseas labor migration is an
option for those who receive enough information to be enticed by
work abroad. Luzon remains the major supplier of overseas workers in
the Philippines. In 2005, the top three suppliers of female OFWs
were CALABARZON (the provinces of Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal
and Quezon), NCR (Metro Manila), and Ilocos Region with 14.4
percent, 13.9 percent, and 11.4 percent, respectively. Also, the
same regions were the top suppliers of male OFWs.
Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and Japan
were the top three countries of destination of OFWs. Of the total
660,000 female OFWs in 2005, 14.7 percent were in Hong Kong; 14.7
percent in Saudi Arabia; and 9.0 percent in Japan. In the 2004
figure of 577,000 female OFWs, Hong Kong accounted for 17.9 percent;
Saudi Arabia with 12.2 percent; and Japan with 10.7 percent.
But, Filipinos working abroad
generally suffer from low regard or even get discriminated. In 2005,
54.9 percent of the total female OFWs were laborers and unskilled
workers, almost the same estimate in 2004 at 55 percent. On the
other hand, some 53.2 percent and 55 percent of male OFWs in 2005
and 2004, respectively, were skilled workers, like machine operators
and assemblers.
Traditionally, women have always
been paid lower than men. Remittances from female OFWs were
relatively lower than their male counterpart. In 2005, of the total
P85.4-billion estimated OFW remittances, around 35.9 percent (P30.7
billion) came from female OFWs. In 2004, 32.9 percent (P26.1
billion) of the P79.3-billion OFW remittances were from female OFWs.
Asian countries were the top source of these remittances with around
75 percent for female OFWs and 60 percent for male OFWs both in 2005
and 2004.
Filipinos continue to become
victims of illegal recruitment in many countries, including South
Korea, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom and the United States.
When apprehended, the victims of illegal recruiters become victims
the second time around, spending time inside jails to pay for their
“crimes.”
Some woman OFWs have been charged
for crimes. One of the latest whose murder conviction was affirmed
was Marilou Ranario, a teacher who sought a job in Kuwait as a
domestic worker. Migrante and the Ranario family have charged that
she wasn’t given appropriate legal advice, a charge denied by the
Department of Foreign Affairs. With the help of President Gloria
Arroyo, Ranario’s sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
Everyday, tear-stricken women
leave for abroad to keep their families afloat. They endure the
dangers of illegal recruitment, lack of protection and exploitation
in their workplaces, and the relatively low pay woman workers
receive.
Haunted by the memories of
Contemplacion and Ranario, they could only question when would the
exploitative mill of women recruited for overseas work stop.
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