PHL, Sri Lanka expected not to become top sources of maids for Gulf region anymore — report

Maids in the Gulf Region will most likely not come from the Philippines and Sri Lanka, the top providers of domestic workers in the region, after the two countries started imposing a new minimum wage scale, among other conditions, the news site Emirates 24/7 said.

On Wednesday, Emirates 24/7 noted that both Sri Lanka and the Philippines “have been working to ensure that if a housemaid does come in from Sri Lanka or the Philippines, the minimum wage scale and other conditions are met.”

“There are ample opportunities available there within (Sri Lanka). Almost 40 per cent of Sri Lankan expatriates in the UAE are unskilled employees. We want to bring this number down,” Sri Lanka Consul General in Dubai M M Abdul Raheem told Emirates 24/7.

In December last year, it was reported that the Philippines has communicated with the UAE regarding tough implementations for sending domestic workers there, manifested through its proposal that maids should paid not less than $400 a month and must have at least eight hours break every day.

The Philippine Embassy in Abu Dhabi communicated the Philippine government’s terms to private labor recruitment agents, and said violators would be put on the blacklist and prohibited from handling domestic workers.

The agents reacted by saying they will not accept such conditions. According to them, domestic workers from any country must be recruited in compliance with the UAE’s official work contract.

A separate article on Emirates 24/7 published on Tuesday reported information from a recruitment consultant who said in an article in broadsheet The Manila Bulletin that some Gulf countries’ immigration officials did not agree with the $400 minimum salary required by the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration.

The consultant, Manny Geslani, said his information was from “reliable sources in the industry.”

His sources identified the disagreeing immigration officials as coming from Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, and Bahrain, all of which are apparently apprehensive of granting Filipino domestic workers visas to show resistance against the salary proposal.

The deployment of Filipino domestic workers to the Middle East would drop by as much as 70 percent this year, Geslani said, should the issue remain unresolved.

Geslani said Saudi Arabia is the only country who agreed to a $400 minimum salary.

According to Geslani, the opposition to the $400-minimum monthly salary by some Middle East countries is a result of the lack of bilateral meetings between the Philippines and these nations’ governments, as well as the lack of minimum wage ceiling provisions in their labor laws. - Gian C. Geronimo, VVP, GMA News

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

PCG: China’s bullying in West Philippine Sea undermines international law --- Ghio Ong - The Philippine Star

MANILA, Philippines — Letting China sustain its aggression in the West Philippine Sea would make other countries doubt the strength of international law currently being asserted by the Philippines, Commodore Jay Tarriela of the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) said. “Allowing China to blatantly disregard the established rules-based order threatens the very foundation that we all depend on,” he wrote in a post on X last Tuesday. He added, “If we permit this, countries worldwide may forget why this order was created in the first place. Nations could begin to doubt the significance of adhering to international law if powerful bullies can easily violate it.” Tarriela also said defiance of other countries to a rules-based order would result in the prevalence of cruelty. He wrote, “This could lead us back to a time when might makes right, undermining the global structures that keep human greed, savagery and barbarism in check. Such a scenario would not only invite challenges from aggressive ...
Read more

Social media seen as cause of rising intermarriages --- Helen Flores - The Philippine Star

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Filipinos Overseas (CFO) sees social media as the main reason for the rising number of Filipinos marrying or becoming partners of foreign nationals. In 2022, the CFO recorded 6,854 marriages or partnerships with foreign nationals, a 40.1 percent increase from the 4,891 “intermarriages” recorded in 2021. “First of all, what we see in the increase in the marriage rate of Filipinos or Filipinos with foreign partners is because of social media, (that) is number one; matchings; letters, introduction of their friends,” CFO chairperson Romulo Arugay said at the Bagong Pilipinas Ngayon public briefing yesterday. Arugay said the agency has been registering a high number of intermarriages since 2007, but the figures went down during the COVID-19 pandemic. From over 6,500 Filipinos who married foreign nationals, only 600 are men, he said. Most of them are married to Americans, Japanese, Germans, Canadians and Australians, Arugay said. Arugay warned Fi...
Read more

China ships maintain presence in key West Philippine Sea areas --- Michael Punongbayan - The Philippine Star

STAR / Michael Varcas MANILA, Philippines — While Chinese vessels in the West Philippine Sea (WPS) have decreased in number, they have maintained a presence in three key land features where naval and coast guard ships have intensified operations in the past seven days, according to the Philippine Navy. Latest monitoring by the Philippine Navy showed armed ships of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) maintaining a menacing presence around the grounded BRP Sierra Madre in Ayungin Shoal, Panatag Shoal and Escoda Shoal. According to the Philippine Navy, there are 17 Chinese military vessels and 28 China Coast Guard (CCG) boats spotted inside the country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) between Sept. 23 and 30, or one vessel more than in the previous week Sept.17-23. Five of the warships were seen roaming around the vicinity of Escoda Shoal, along with 10 CCG vessels and 12 maritime militia vessels (MMVs). There are also two PLAN ships in Ayungin Shoal as well as 10 CCG boats and 12...
Read more