A migrant workers' rights group called Wednesday for the permanent banning of a Saudi Arabian conglomerate from recruiting overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), claiming that the firm has been detaining over 80 OFWs in its various warehouses after they protested against deplorable working conditions. The multimillion firm based in Riyadh was accused of prohibiting 88 Filipino women workers from leaving its warehouses after they refused to work in protest against the firm's alleged unfair labor practices like reduced wages, prolonged work hours and withholding promised benefits. Its recruitment arm supplies manpower such as janitors, patient attendants, dental assistants and caregivers to various government-run medical facilities and rehabilitation centers all over the Kingdom, the militant group Mingrante International said Thursday. On Oct. 12 last year, three separate groups of OFWs decided to stop working in protest against the company's alleged violations of their employment contract, and they have since been locked up in “crowded and unhealthy” structures, according to Migrante. The Philippine embassy in Riyadh has been helping to speed up the workers repatriation after it learned about the workers' plight, Martinez said. As this developed, Migrante renewed its call for the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) to permanently delist the company from its list of accredited foreign employers. The company was banned from recruiting workers from the Philippines in 2005 due to a number of complaints filed by its workers but the ban was lifted after a Filipino labor attache said the cases had been resolved and the agency had instituted reforms in employing workers.
