Doctor and social worker
should stay at consulate



A LONG overdue program to place a Filipino doctor and social worker in every Philippine diplomatic mission in countries with large numbers of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) was finally started last year and has been a success so far.

Unfortunately, due to a lack of funding, this has only been a pilot program. In Jeddah, Fatima Abobakar, a social worker who has been counseling distressed OFWs, especially runaway maids, is scheduled to return to the Philippines this August. Dr. Ramon Moreno, who has been giving free medical advice to OFWs, is scheduled to leave in October.

OFWs for years had been clamoring for the Philippine government to deploy such type of caregivers to its diplomatic missions abroad to help the least fortunate among OFWs, be they unpaid workers or abused maids.

The labor attaché in Jeddah is planning to submit a report on their performance to the Secretary of Labor in Manila, who in turn will submit a combined report of all social and medical workers deployed abroad to the Senate Finance Committee. The Jeddah mission is planning to request an extension of their services.

But in my mind a mere extension is not enough. A medical doctor and a social worker should have always been part of the Philippines' diplomatic missions in countries with many Filipino workers. Their work is essential and absolutely necessary. So many Filipinos working here have no medical insurance, depending on handouts from their employers or friends to cover their medical expenses when they fall sick.

Unfortunately, Dr. Moreno has not been able to write prescriptions for patients here due to regulatory restrictions, but I'm sure an agreement and accreditation could be worked out with the Saudi Ministry of Health.

As for Fatima Abobakar, well let's just say that a runaway maid would almost certainly feel more comfortable talking with a female social worker than with a male labor official. As I have written many times before, domestic helpers continue to be the most vulnerable and abused segment of the OFW population, not only here in Saudi Arabia but also in Singapore and Hong Kong.

Last week a Singapore labor group put forward a proposal to codify maids' rights in law, to give them a mandatory day off once a week, and to have them covered by the country's labor laws. These are all excellent proposals and the same thing should be implemented here in the Kingdom. The Shoura Council should look into drafting a new law that would cover the rights of domestic helpers, setting a minimum wage for them, mandating a weekly day-off and extending the protection of labor laws to them.

Maids are the real unsung heroines of the Philippine workforce abroad, the silent army of women who keep whole families running smoothly by cleaning, cooking, washing and ironing, and yes, even mothering the children of their employers.

I'm sure the Philippine government will be able to find the funding to keep this program going at all Philippine missions that need it. OFWs have helped to keep the Philippine economy afloat for years now with their billions of dollars in yearly remittances. The least the Philippine government can do is help the most vulnerable of the OFWs.

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PRESIDENT GLORIA Macapagal-Arroyo's recently announced campaign against drugs both within drug enforcement agencies and within the general public is a laudable goal. The problem is how much can really be achieved?

I've written before about narco-politics, pointing out the huge influence that drug lords have over national governments, including that of the Philippines. Just last week, a Philippine congressman announced that at least 40 percent of Filipino politicians had benefited either directly or indirectly from drugs money. How he came up with this estimate I don't know, but I find it very believable.

The president on Monday admitted that many anti-narcotic units of the Philippine National Police have been found to be selling seized drugs themselves.

She also said she liked the proposed idea of the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption (VACC) to poison all seized drugs so that they couldn't be used or resold later.

Well, it's been a well-known fact that the anti-narcotic units of the police have also been some of the most corrupt ones; the drug enforcement officers obviously unable to resist the lure of quick and easy profits to be had from reselling seized drugs. A crackdown on this should have been started a longtime ago, with stiff penalties for those found guilty of doing so. But poisoning the drugs seems to me to be a rather loony idea. Call it anti-drug zeal taken to its logical extreme. As the slogan goes: "Drugs kill", so why don't we just speed it up a little?! Poisoning the drugs would be extremely dangerous, not the least because some of it might be resold to unsuspecting drug users on the street who would then die from using the drugs.

Thankfully, Sen. Franklin Drilon turned down VACC's wacky proposal and said that instead drug enforcement agencies should just follow the existing law that says all seized illegal drugs should be destroyed within 24 hours. Of course, small amounts are kept as evidence to be produced in court during the trial of accused drug traffickers and pushers, but it shouldn't be enough for corrupt policemen to resell on the street.

It's the sad truth that drug syndicates have established wide networks throughout the Philippines for the production and sale of illegal drugs, especially shabu. Occasional raids by police dismantle some drug laboratories, but these are just the tip of the iceberg. It is undoubtedly true that some politicians, from the barangay level all the way up to the Senate, have been bought off or otherwise tainted by drug money.

The only hope we have in combating this menace is for politicians and drug enforcement personnel to see the real damage that drugs are doing to individuals, families and whole communities.

Comments or questions? E-mail the author at manilamoods@hotmail.com. Visit the author's website at www.manilamoods.com to read past columns.