OFW from Kuwait wins house and lot in Villar summit

MANILA, Philippines — Christmas came early for an overseas Filipino worker (OFW) who won a Lessandra house and lot, the grand prize during the 10th OFW and Family Summit.

“This is a beautiful Christmas gift. We prayed for this,” said Rodrigo Pido, as he thanked Sen. Cynthia Villar and her family, former senator Manny Villar, former DPWH secretary Mark Villar, House Deputy Speaker Camille Villar and Vista Land president Paolo Villar.

Pido, a resident of Pasig City, described the annual summit as a huge help to OFWs and their families.

More than 5,000 OFWs coming from all over the world participated in this year’s summit.

“Thank you to you, the Villar family! Many thanks to Villar SIPAG (Social Institute for Poverty Alleviation and Governance),” said a jubilant Pido.

Due to the global health crisis, the father of four related that his employer opted to end his contract as coordinator of ground equipment at an airport.

The participants in the summit also got prizes consisting of appliances, sari-sari store packages and two motorcycles.

Former public works secretary Villar, who likewise served as congressman of Las Piñas, said their family will continuously support our migrant workers.

He acknowledged OFWs as the real heroes of our country, and considered the summit as their family’s “small way” of helping OFWs and their families to embark on businesses under the new normal.

“We will all recover from this pandemic,” noted the former DPWH secretary, who is seeking a Senate seat in next year’s election.

Rep. Villar said the summit is held annually to pay tribute to our OFWs, “modern-day heroes.” “You all deserve to reap the fruits of your hard work; you also deserve to be honored for your sacrifices.”

For his part, SIPAG founding chairman and former senator Villar cited the need to continue the OFW Summit, saying OFWs are currently facing more and more challenges.

“We started this (summit) 10 years ago with the goal of helping our countrymen who are out of the country. As House speaker and Senate president, I saw the many problems of our OFWs,” he added.

In her inspirational message, Sen. Villar said this year’s theme “Masiglang Kabuhayan sa Bagong Panahon” is very timely and relevant as we are all struggling to go back to our normal lives.

“This year, we really committed to push through with the summit so we can celebrate a decade of togetherness and new learnings. We can even get together online. It’s fun because I feel how excited you are for the return of our OFW Summit,” the senator said in Filipino.

“We brought the best experts from the business sector and also friends from government to teach the migrant workers how to handle your finances, and provide them with information about business and livelihood opportunities and government reintegration programs for OFWs,” she added.

The 10th summit, Sen. Villar said, comes at a time when overseas employment is down, and more than 100,000 OFWs were repatriated by government from January to October of this year.

From two million OFWs deployed in 2019 before the pandemic, the number dropped to 612,542 from January to October 2021. For the month of October, only 66,545 OFWs went abroad.