Maltreated OFW returns home

BACOLOD CITY, Philippines  - An overseas Filipino worker (OFW) from this city was finally back home from Kuwait where she was maltreated by her employer and was even jailed.

Annalyn Sayson, 26 years old and resident of Brgy. Estefania in this city, thanked the city government for helping her go home.

Sayson, who was presented to the media by Mayor Evelio Leonardia in his regular press conference yesterday, said that before she was able to go home to our country, she stayed at the Philippine Embassy in Kuwait for three months.

At the Embassy, she discovered that about 200 OFWs were also stranded there, apparently in the same plight as hers. She said that runaway OFWs arrive there almost every day seeking help from the Philippine government.

Sayson narrated that she applied as domestic helper for Kuwait through a local recruitment agency. She arrived Kuwait on November 9, 2009 and was employed as househelp by an Arab family.

Her lady employer however would hit her without justifiable reason and her salary was always delayed. After eight months through this ordeal, she decided to escape and sought the help of the Philippine Embassy.

Immediately after her escape, she bought a plane ticket for a trip back to the Philippines, but on July 31 last year, while waiting at the Immigration Office of Kuwait for her clearance to leave the country, she was arrested and was locked up in jail.

Sayson said her employer filed a complaint of abandonment against her and it was the reason why she was barred from leaving the country and was detained instead at the Kuwait Central Jail.

She was able to inform her family in Bacolod and her parents solicited the help of Leonardia.

Upon the intercession of the city government, through the Sectoral Concerns Office headed by lawyer Vicente Petierre III, Sayson was released from jail and was able to return home on January 13. (FREEMAN)