DESPITE the return to the country on Monday of 138 Overseas Filipino Workers who were stranded in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for various reasons. Many stranded workers who remain in Saudi Arabia continue to seek President Rodrigo Duterte’s assistance.
One of these OFWs is my own brother, Jonathan Jaron, who is now stranded, along with 41 others from United Seemac/ M&R Al-Owaidah Company. My brother has finished his contract and has stopped work but is still in Riyadh since April 20, 2016 awaiting his unpaid salaries.
He said that he and his other fellow workers have been constantly following up their claims at the company’s head office in Riyadh and were repeatedly given promises by the owner that they would be paid and sent home.
But, after months of dialogue with the management and our long wait, we started to get sceptical of their words and now convinced that they don’t have good plans for us. I and my companions are so depressed here without money and feel so much homesickness.
“We don’t know how long we still have to wait here.
“We can’t just leave without our unpaid wages ranging from 8 months to 20 months,” Jonathan said in his letter addressed to President Duterte, one of the many letters he has written him and other officials of his administration regarding their plight.”
Jonathan earlier wrote Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III and a number of his representatives, as well as Director Jaime LLaguno Mabilin of the Presidential Complaint Center.
In his letter to Director Mabilin, he asked why his group from United Seemac/ M&R Al-Owaidah Company were not included in the list of attendees in the meeting of the OFWs with the President at Mariott Hotel on April 12, and [why the Philippine Embassy in Riyadh] “did not even invite and/or consult stranded, depressed, problematic groups regarding the said meeting.”
“I observed that they were selective in identifying groups to the said venue to avoid having a troublesome forum.
“But why do have to hide this scenario? What then is the purpose of the President’s visit? Even a single stranded group has not been included in the list of [the 149 groups that were invited to the forum].
“This [could have been] the proper and most important venue where we can air our concerns to the President himself, but the embassy withheld us from this opportunity,” he further lamented. The Presidential Complaint Center has forwarded the letter to OWWA.”
The DOLE and OWWA have yet to reply to the letter of Jonathan. It is indeed sad if not any of the 149 groups invited to the forum represented any group of stranded workers. He said those who were invited even consisted of sports organizations of Filipinos in KSA. BEEN THERE DONE THAT/JOSEPHINE CODILLA
