Recto: Give OFWs red carpet treatment, help displaced workers too

Recto presides over session: Senate President Pro-Tempore Ralph Recto presides over the approval of a bill on alternative learning system as well as the adoption of resolutions honoring the late Sen. Heherson Alvarez and the use of teleconference during plenary sessions and hearings on national emergencies Monday, May 4, 2020. (Henzberg Austria/ Senate PRIB)

MANILA, Philippines—Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto urged the government to give returning overseas Filipino workers the best possible treatment after he saw images of them spending the night on the pavement in one of the terminals of Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

In a statement released Saturday, Recto said that there should be teams who would escort returning OFWs to hotels where they could spend some time before getting the clearance to go back to their respective homes in the Philippines.

“They deserve a red carpet treatment, not a sidewalk reception,” said Recto in a statement. “Disturbing scenes such as these should now be a thing of the past.”

“Kung kulang ng tao na sasalubong at aalalay sa kanila, pwedeng mag-hire. Halimbawa, kung mayroong sweeper flights sa ere, kailangan din ng mga sweeper teams on the ground na dadalhin sa mga hotels yung mga OFWs na natutulog sa sidewalk.”

(If there aren’t enough people to do the job, they can hire additional personnel. For example, if there are sweeper flights, there should also be sweeper teams on the ground who can bring the OFWs sleeping on the sidewalk to the hotels.)

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, who heads the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases, announced that OFWs will be sent home not later than five days after they arrive in the country.

“Let us hope that this is finally the beginning of a scaled up handling of returning OFWs so that the huge global backlog in OFWs wanting to go home will be reduced,” said Recto who welcomed Lorenzana’s announcement.

Recto, however, added that the new measure can still be improved upon and that the “gone in five days” policy should be applied nationally and not just within Metro Manila.

Apart from OFWs staying the nights in the airport, Recto also urged the government to look into the plight of the out-of-job construction workers (OCW) with “tens of thousands” getting stranded inside Metro Manila after Luzon was put in lockdown.

There have been reports and documented cases of OCWs walking from Metro Manila to their respective provinces since public transport was suspended when the enhanced community quarantine was put in place.

“As we increase capacity for domestic repatriation, we should include jobless, homeless local workers, for they, too, have as much right to government help as their overseas counterparts,” said Recto.

According to government reports, there are 1.4 million construction workers who lost their jobs a month after lockdown was ordered and all kinds of construction work were banned on March 16.