JEDDAH: Distressed Filipino workers stranded at the deportation center in Jeddah are facing more woes as they are allegedly being asked to pay for their air tickets home by some Philippine officials whose job is supposed to be to provide them financial assistance. This complaint was raised on Tuesday by Migrante, a Filipino migrant rights group, after it received appeals for help from Filipino workers detained at cell numbers 14 and 16 of the deportation center. The workers claimed that officials of the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) have been asking them to pay SR1,200 to SR2,000 for their one-way air tickets to Manila, said Marlon Gatdula, Migrante-Saudi Arabia deputy secretary-general. “Since they are looking forward to their immediate repatriation, some of those distressed and stranded will try their best to raise the said amount for their airfare by asking help from their relatives in the Philippines. But what is confusing is that there is a 100 million-peso (over SR9 million) OWWA repatriation fund intended for that purpose,” Gatdula said. He said he could not understand why OWWA officials are asking for airfare money from the cash-starved Filipino workers who have been stranded for months at the deportation center. “Why squeeze them until they bleed?” Gatdula asked. Migrante-Middle East regional coordinator John Leonard Monterona said he posed the same question to Philippine Charge De Affaires Ezzadin Tago. “CDA Tago promised to get the attention of OWWA officials in Jeddah,” Monterona said. “Is there an internal policy by OWWA to ask distressed and stranded OFWs (overseas Filipino workers) to pay for their own ticket?” Monterona asked. “There is nothing wrong if OWWA solicits money from businessmen and politicians to raise an amount for the airfare of distressed and stranded OFWs; but air tickets should not be a burden and a cause for the delays of the eventual repatriation of OFWs,” he stressed.
