Group steps up drive to bring home 200 ‘abused’ Pinays in Jordan

MANILA, Philippines - Migrant rights advocacy group Migrante International is taking actions to bring home about 200 female overseas Filipino workers (OFW) stranded in Jordan.

Lian Santos, Migrante deputy secretary-general, on Tuesday told GMANews.TV that his group intensified its “Bring Them Home" campaign, which began last month.

“Walang katotohanan ang… sinasabi ng gobyerno na may ginagawa sila para sa OFWs (There is no truth in the government’s claim that it is doing something for the OFWs)," said Santos.

GMANews.TV on Tuesday tried but failed to get the side of the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) on the issue. DFA Undersecretary Esteban Conejos talked to GMANews.TV on his cellphone and said that he could not yet comment on the issue because he was in the middle of a meeting.

Santos said Migrante’s chapter coordinator abroad has the names of 108 of the 200 female OFWs in Jordan. Most of them who were recruited illegally ran away after they were maltreated by their employers and deprived of their wages, according to Migrante.

Jordan's Labor Ministry said in January that there were about 16,000 Filipinos working in the said Southwest Asian country.

Santos declined the request of GMANews.TV to release the names of the 108 women “so that their identities can be protected."

He claimed that most of these women who were not allowed by their employers to go back to the Philippines did not receive their salaries. The OFWs were reportedly told that they could only leave Jordan if they would pay US$1,500 each to their employers and shoulder their airfare back to the Philippines.

Migrante has been coordinating with the OFWs who are facing about 1,000 cases of work-related violations in Jordan, according to Santos. The group is also lobbying the cases of the OFWs to lawmakers and appealing to the media to help these women get public attention.

The DFA in a recent report acknowledged the plight of OFWs in Jordan.

"The working conditions of more than half of domestic helpers comprising 95 percent of OFWs in Jordan, can be considered unsatisfactory and problematic and need improvement," the DFA said.

As of July 18, 2007, data from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights showed that Jordan was not a signatory to the 1990 UN International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers.

Last July 31, the Department of Labor and Employment (DoLE) lifted an eight-month ban on sending workers to Jordan after setting a minimum wage of US$400 for OFWs recruited to work in the said country.

DoLE made the move in the hopes of eliminating abuse and exploitation of OFWs in Jordan. - Kimberly Jane T. Tan, GMANews.TV

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