THE Philippine ambassador to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Grace Relucio Princesa, is facing another complaint, this time for the alleged non-payment of furniture that she asked a businesswoman to ship to UAE ostensibly to showcase them for Arab clients at the Philippine Embassy.

Earlier, a group of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) based in the UAE accused Princesa of allegedly misusing funds and ill-treating Filipinos. They appealed to the Department of Foreign Affairs to replace her.

The businesswoman, a furniture designer and manufacturer, claimed that she was duped by Princesa into shipping over P2-million worth of furniture that eventually found their way to the envoy’s official residence instead to the Philippine Embassy.

The complainant told The Manila Times that when she met Princesa three years ago, the ambassador promised to showcase her furniture in the UAE to promote Philippine products.

The furniture designer, who requested anonymity, said that the planned showcasing of her products, all proto-types of her original design, initially failed to materialize because Princesa kept them at her official residence.

She said that the proper place to showcase the pieces of furniture was the Philippine Embassy.
However, Princesa chose some items to be kept at her residence and transferred the rest to the Philippine Embassy.

The businesswoman said that while Princesa paid her for several pieces of furniture left at her official residence, the ambassador has not paid for the remaining items, which are kept at the embassy, contrary to their agreement to sell everything that was left.

She added that she could have doubled her money during the two years that her furniture were with Princesa. She asked the DFA to help her collect her money or recover her furniture, but went to The Times when she got impatient with the DFA’s slow action. She had read The Times’ article about alleged irregularities committed by Princesa in UAE as charged by a group of OFWs.

In a letter to Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario, the Alliance of Concerned OFWs in Abu Dhabi (ACO-OFW) alleged that Princesa misused community funds intended for charitable projects meant to help distressed Filipinos in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and other emirates.

They also charged that the Independence Day and Paskuhan celebrations sponsored by the embassy had been the source of “graft and deception,” with the Independence Day celebrations serving as a “milking cow of corrupt community leaders in connivance with the ambassador.”

They asked del Rosario to replace Princesa for allowing the “shabby” treatment of the more than 400,000 OFWs and their dependents by the embassy staff in the UAE.