2 OFW families from Cebu win OWWA Family of Year awards

MANILA, Philippines—Families of overseas Filipino workers from Cebu on Wednesday won the prestigious Model OFW Family of the Year awards given by the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration in ceremonies held at the Hotel Sofitel in Manila.

The family of Dr. Carlito Astillero from Barangay (village) Labangon, Cebu City, was awarded the MOFYA trophy for the land-based category while the family of ship engineer Candido Caminero from Argao, Cebu, won the sea-based category.

Caminero has been a marine engineer for 40 years. He, his wife, Elizabeth, and their nine children initiated various community outreach programs as they engaged in various businesses such as corn milling, poultry, sand and gravel business, hog-raising and cultivated agricultural lots.

Caminero, a former farmer, is now a technical adviser for the National Irrigators Association. He said he shifted to fishing and became interested in becoming a seafarer.

He said pets and music were his and his wife’s way of keeping their children home and the family close.

“Since they were young we taught them how to be responsible. We gave them pets like dogs or goats. And after school, we asked them to go home quickly. We bought them music instruments so they can avoid vice,” Caminero said.

On the other hand, Astillero has worked in a Saudi Arabia hospital for the past 35 years. He is the founder of the Order of the Knights of Rizal in Riyadh.

Together with his wife, Elena, and their five children, Astillero invested his hard-earned savings in two houses in Cebu, a trading center, a medical clinic and some agricultural lands.

The doctor said distance was not a factor in keeping in touch with his children and being close as a family during his long absence from home.

“We had constant communication, constant [giving of] advice, and what I call ‘distance discipline.’ Before it was difficult because communication was not easy, but during this last 15 years, it’s very easy and it was timely for me because at that time they were already in high school and college. And I guided them properly even if I was far from them,” he recounted.

Astillero, now the proud father of one lawyer, two doctors, one engineer and one nurse, said it was not easy being an OFW.

“But if you have some plans for the future of your family and yourself, then you have to do the best you can. And during that time, I found out that to go abroad is just one of the ways I can give a better life for your family,” he said.

The winning families won P600,000 each and other prizes courtesy of OWWA and private sponsors led by Globe and BPI.

“MOFYA pays tribute to families that remain solid and stable despite the odds and challenge they face and encounter. They value and place great premium on optimizing the socioeconomic gains of migration and minimizing the attendant costs. We hope that they (new awardees) will continue to inspire and serve as epitome to others,” said OWWA Administrator Carmelita Dimzon.

Thirty other regional awardees, one each for the land and sea categories, were also honored. The family of ship captain Celso Banag from Ramos, Tarlac, bagged the Outstanding Achievement Award for Community Projects while the family of another ship captain, Manolo Gacutan from Bautista, Pangasinan, won the Outstanding Achievement Award for Entrepreneurship.

Vice President Jejomar Binay and Senator Jinggoy Estrada, chairman of the Senate committee on labor and human resource development, also graced the Awards.

Estrada lauded OFW families who remained intact despite years of separation, and had managed to find time in helping their communities.

Labor Undersecretary Danilo Cruz, reading the speech of President Aquino, said: “It is clear that the priority of our administration is to make working abroad not the only means to prosper. That is why we are intensifying job opportunities here in the Philippines so that our fellow countrymen need not leave the country to find a nice and worthwhile job.”