Kian, Carl slays a wake-up call to OFW parents
The deaths of Kian Loyd delos Santos and Carl Angelo Arnaiz should be a wake-up call for parents, especially those who work overseas, to be always aware of their children's activities.
Aldrin Mejares, a 30-year-old nurse in Saudi Arabia, said constant monitoring and communication "on the importance of self-limitation" is important especially if the children are still minors.
"For those minors, i-monitor na lang sila through other family member and always advise them on the importance of self-limitation," he said.
Delos Santos, 17, was killed in a police anti-narcotic operation in Barangay 160 in Caloocan City last August 16, while Arnaiz, 19, was killed after he allegedly robbed a taxi driver on C3 Road in the same city on August 18. Both were children of OFWs.
Though police claimed the two were killed in a shootout, autopsy and forensic reports appear to show otherwise.
"Ray," 40, an IT worker in Singapore, said parents should impose a curfew on their children, saying minors should not be allowed to stay out late at night.
"In our household, we don't encourage or tolerate staying out late at night," he said. "I even welcome and support our local government's initiative to implement a (10pm-4 am) curfew."
For her part, Evelyn Lescano Velicaria, 43, a personal assistant in Taiwan and a mother to two girls, said: "Ingatan ang mga anak para hindi nasasangkot sa ganyang problema."
Velicaria was blunt in saying that parents should be blamed and even punished if a minor gets in trouble with the law.
"Dapat ang ipatupad diyan sa Pilipinas, 'pag menor de edad nagkasala, dapat magulang ang ikulong," she said.
Meanwhile, for Leo Caballero, a 35-year-old former driver in the Embassy of Burkina Faso in Russia, said President Rodrigo Duterte is partly to blame for the deaths of Delos Santos and Arnaiz because of his bloody war on drugs.
"Nakakapanlumo ang war on drugs. Nadadamay mga inosente. Ang may baril, pag binigyan mo ng kapangyarihan, palaging mahuhulog sa pang-aabuso," he said.
Like the other interviewees, Caballero said he is not comfortable having his children out of the house late at night.
Other OFWs interviewed by GMA News Online, however, were still supportive of Duterte despite his controverial anti-drug war, noting the gravity of the illegal drug problem in the country before he assumed office.
"It is not appropriate to blame [Duterte]!" Mejares said. "I have faith in him na malilinis niya ang ating bansa." He added he is living it to the investigating bodies to determine what really transpired in the killings of Delos Santos and Arnaiz.
Aside from Delos Santos and Arnaiz, another teenager, 14-year-old Reynaldo de Guzman, was also found dead, with his body showing close to 30 stab wounds and his head wrapped in packaging tape, on September 5.
Found in a creek in Gapan, Nueva Ecija, De Guzman was the companion of Arnaiz on the night they went missing. —KBK/KVD, GMA News
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