Bus drivers to file class suit vs recruiter

MANILA, Philippines - The more than 100 Filipino bus drivers who were stranded in Dubai, United Arab Emirates is filing a class suit against their recruiter today.

Blas Ople Center president Susan Ople said the bus drivers who have returned from Dubai as victims of an illegal recruitment scam perpetrated by a licensed agency and a private lending company will troop to Manila City Hall to seek damages and nullify individual loans amounting to P1.9 million per bus driver.

One hundred thirty-seven drivers left their jobs to apply with CYM International, which offered employment in Dubai with the Road and Travel Authority as bus drivers with a monthly salary of P67,000 in dirhams.

CYM International Services referred the applicants to RJJ Lacaba Financing Corp. to obtain loans to cover the placement fee of P150,300 each.

In obtaining these loans, Ople said, the drivers were asked to sign documents as well as undated postdated checks, without the benefit of receiving copies of such documents, receipts and written computations or even verbal explanations about the transactions.

However, upon arrival in Dubai, the promise of one-month training and immediate hiring fizzled out and they were forced to live like beggars.  

“This is a team effort for justice,” Susan Ople, president of the center said, adding that even the wives of the bus drivers still in Dubai have sought the permission of their husbands to join the suit.

Through the complaint, the bus drivers are also seeking the award of actual, compensatory damages amounting to P100,000 each; moral damages amounting to P100,000 each; and, exemplary damages amounting to P100,000 or a total of P300,000 per complainant.

The bus drivers said the damages should be jointly and solidarily paid by defendants CYM International Services and Placement Agency, Connie Paloma, Richard Tentano, Carolina Estano, and Jason Paloma, RJJ Lacaba Financing Corp., Elmer Lim, Felipe Geronimo, Asia United Bank, Paramount Life and General Insurance Corp., and HQR Technical Insurance Agency, Inc.