Saudi prince asked to facilitate probe on Pinay's slay

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines has appealed to the emir of the Saudi Eastern Province, Prince Mohammad Bin Fahad Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, to facilitate the investigation on the murder of a Filipina household service worker, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said yesterday.

Citing a report of the Philippine embassy in Riyadh, the DFA said Philippine Ambassador Antonio Villamor met with the Saudi emir and referred the murder case of Romelyn Ybanez of North Cotabato, who died of stab wounds and acid burns.

The Saudi emir assured the immediate release of Ybanez’s autopsy report and his personal assurance to see to it that justice will be served.

Ybanez was found in the kitchen of her employer’s home in Al-Khobar with stab wounds in her neck, abdomen and wrist and acid burns in her mouth area, arms and legs.

Police recovered an almost empty container of sulfuric acid from the scene.

The Filipina worker was taken by the Red Crescent to the King Fahd Hospital on Sept. 8, where she died of wounds and acid ingestion.

The Philippine Overseas Employment Agency (POEA) has informed the DFA that an administrative case was already filed against PRA Solidworks Manpower Resources and Promotion, Ybanez’s recruitment agency, due to contract violations.

POEA issued an Order of Preventive Suspension against the recruitment agency.

The victim was deployed on May 31 supposedly as a nursing aide, only to end up as a household helper.

According to the DFA, the embassy is already in the process of selecting a trial lawyer to handle the case, using the Legal Assistance Fund (LAF).

The DFA noted that the LAF has been expanded to cover both the legal defense and prosecution of cases involving Filipinos with the passage of the Republic Act 10022, or the Revised Migrant Workers Act.

However, migrant workers scored the DFA for agreeing to slash legal assistance funding, even if the office has been regularly flooded with demands for legal services of Filipinos abroad.

Budget cuts will hurt OFWs

Migrante International criticized the deep cuts in the DFA budget for assistance to distressed overseas workers.

Dolores Balladares, chair of the United Filipinos in Hong Kong (UNIFIL-MIGRANTE-HK), said slashing the legal assistance fund for OFWs from P50 million to P27 million showed the Aquino government is willing to leave OFWs rotting in prison.

“In the name of austerity, the Aquino government is willing to leave OFWs rotting in prison, forcing us to drop hopes of redress for abuses we suffered, and practically dragging OFWs in death row to the chair,” Balladares said.

She said the act of the government is gravely frustrating to OFWs who have waited for months to see how the President will respond to the condition and concerns of migrant Filipinos.

The UNIFIL-MIGRANTE-HK urged the government to go after plunderers, tax evaders, corrupt officials and those using their office to live in luxury and not one of the most needed services for OFWs.

“If there is belt-tightening to be done, the cuts should be made on repayment of debts that the people did not benefit from and on the military budget that either goes to the pockets of corrupt officers or to military operations that target the innocents,” Balladares said.

She said one of the long-standing demands of OFWs is for Philippine posts to hire in-house lawyers who are readily available to give legal advice and assistance.

She added that the demand for legal assistance abroad is always on the rise as policies in host countries have worsened.

Balladares also reiterated Migrante’s criticism of the budget cut as running counter to the provision of the Magna Carta for OFWs, which explicitly said that the legal assistance fund for OFWs should amount to P100 million.

The Migrant Workers and Overseas Filipinos Act provides a legal assistance fund for migrant workers, with an allocation of P100 million to be constituted from the following sources: P50 million from the Contingency Fund of the President; P30 million from the Presidential Social Fund; and P20 million from the Welfare Fund for Overseas Workers established under Letter of Instruction No. 537, as amended by Presidential Decree Nos. 1694 and 1809.

The Blas F. Ople Policy Center, a non-government organization actively involved in migration issues, urged President Aquino to reconsider the deep cuts in the budget of the DFA allocated for assistance to distressed overseas workers.

Former labor undersecretary and Center president Susan Ople described the cuts as “untimely and unjustifiable” considering the increasing number of trafficked victims and in light of a new law that mandates the DFA to certify whether labor-receiving countries are suitable places of destination for Filipino workers.

The DFA 2011 budget is down to P10.98 billion from P19 billion in 2010. Also significantly cut was the budget for the assistance to nationals, from P200 million in 2010 to P109.3 million for 2011.

The P109.3-million budget for OFWs is divided into P81.9 million for assistance to nationals, and P27.3 million legal assistance fund.

According to the Ople Center, the new law, Republic Act No. 10022 amending the Migrant Workers’ Act of 1995, mandates the DFA to use its legal assistance fund to file charges against foreign employers and agencies abroad in behalf of aggrieved Filipino workers.

“Our government is sending mixed signals to our OFWs and the international community. In his inaugural address, President Aquino instructed the DFA to be more responsive to the needs of OFWs and yet the budget department slashed its budget by more than 40 percent. How can it be more responsive with such meager funds?” she said.

Ople noted that more than 3,000 Filipinos continue to languish in jail while thousands more are awaiting repatriation after suffering abuse and maltreatment at the hands of their employers.