Migrante dares Duterte to probe execs who fail to look into OFW plight

BACOLOD CITY-Josie Perez Lloren, 40, was very ill when she returned home on Jan. 26 after working as a domestic helper in Kuwait for a little more than two years.

About two weeks later, she died in a hospital in Caloocan City where she was brought immediately upon arrival.

She didn’t get to go home to her hometown in Murcia, Negros Occidental.

“We want to know what happened to my sister in Kuwait, and we are seeking government’s help,” said brother Greg Perez, a jeepney driver who works in Cebu.

Monina Gulmatico, Migrante head in Negros Occidental, said they would raise the case of Lloren at the Senate hearing on Wednesday.

The hearing would tackle the death of domestic helper Joanna Demafelis of Sara, Iloilo, who was found dead inside a freezer, and other victims of abuse and maltreatment in Kuwait.

Maltreatment

Like most Filipino domestic helpers, Lloren also left her hometown in Murcia in 2016 to work in Kuwait to support her family.

But Perez said his sister complained that the wife of her employer maltreated her and would sometimes lock her up and make her sleep in the comfort room.

She told her recruitment agency about the maltreatment but it only assigned her to another employer instead of reporting the matter to the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration, and allowing her to return to the Philippines.

Lloren failed to renew her membership with OWWA while working for her second employer, who made her work “very hard.”

Return

In January, Migrante facilitated her return to the country because she was suffering from acute ulcers that caused her stomach to bleed internally.

Gulmatico said they suspected that she may not have been fed properly, which caused her ulcer.

When she arrived in Manila on Jan. 26, she was half her original size and was brought immediately to the hospital because she was too weak, said Laorence Castillo, Migrante International program coordinator.

She died two weeks later due to cardio-respiratory arrest secondary to cerebral vascular disease probably bleeding.

Lloren was finally reunited with her family on Feb. 16 when her remains were brought home.

She was laid to rest at the public cemetery in Murcia last Monday.

Probe

Migrante dared President Duterte to investigate erring officials who failed to look into the plight of OFWs in distress.

“We call on the Duterte administration to publicize the bilateral agreement it intends to sign with Kuwait with regard to the protection of Filipino workers and ensure that the voices of OFWs will be heard and their demands included,” it said.

“May the perpetrators be punished as we also raise our call for justice for all the many victims of the government’s negligence towards distressed migrants in dire need of immediate help,” Migrante said.