DOFW a promising initiative if done right

DETAILS are emerging about the proposed scope and responsibilities of the Department of Overseas Filipino Workers (DOFW), which would be created by legislation and is currently being debated in Congress. The ideas sound like promising solutions to the unwieldy and sometimes ineffective institutional framework for OFW concerns at present. That will not matter, however, if the new DOFW is allowed to go the way of so many other good ideas: grand in concept but disappointing in execution.

The DOFW would serve as an umbrella agency for the various OFW-related regulatory activities and services that are now managed by several agencies such as the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) and the Overseas Workers’ Welfare Administration (OWWA). The creation of a single, dedicated department to administer OFW affairs is an idea that has been proposed repeatedly for years but has not gained much traction until now, inspired in part by several recent high-profile cases of distressed OFWs in different countries.