“Rather than push OFWs to pay for social security, the government should push the employers to pay and ensure their workers’ security.”

By ALYSSA MAE CLARIN
bulatlat.com

MANILA — A migrant rights group called for the repeal of a law that requires overseas Filipino workers to cough up a monthly premium for their social security.

“It is clearly a legalized ‘hold-up’ for OFWs. There is nothing more cruel than a government that wants to make money out of its citizens’ desperate moves to work abroad,” said Arman Hernando, Migrante-Philippines president said in a statement.

In February 2018, President Rodrigo Duterte signed the Social Security Act, where, among its provisions, OFWs are required to contribute to the Social Security System. Their contribution, too, will increase from 10 percent to 12 and even up to 15 percent in 2025.

According to the draft Implementing Rules and Regulations of the act, workers need to pay their monthly contributions (P2,400/per month for land-based OFWs, and P800/per month for seafarers) first before they could get their overseas employment certificate (OEC)

Migrante led yesterday’s protest action outside the main office of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration in Ortigas yesterday, March 26. They also held a petition signing during their program.

Such monthly premium, they said, should instead be “voluntary.”

Dire working, living conditions

Overseas Filipino groups are not happy with the said law as many migrant workers are being subjected to poor living and working conditions abroad.

After learning about the new law, former OFW Feliza Benitez was reminded of how she was practically treated like a slave in Hong Kong for 25 years. This, she said, is an added burden to Filipino migrant workers, especially those whose employers are not following their supposed salary and benefits as stipulated in the contracts they signed before leaving the country.

“Not a lot is left from our salary, even if we only subtract the expenses for our daily needs,” Benitez said, adding that it will have a “big effect, especially on their remittances for their families back home.”

“What if the employer cancels the contract after the worker pays (the contribution)? Then the three month’s payment will be for nothing,” she added.

On top of these,Benitez shared that there are migrant workers who endure poor living conditions, with some who are forced to sleep along corridors, and are only provided food once a day. Many, too, are being subjected to verbal abuse.

“Let the people decide, how much they want to pay for contribution. That’s all we want,” she said.

State exactions

This is not the first time that the government has imposed mandatory fees on Filipinos seeking job abroad.

For instance, the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration implemented a program dubbed as “Balik-Manggagawa Program” that supposedly grants financial aid to returning OFWs like Benitez.

However, even after 25 years of working abroad, Benitez only managed to avail of P20,000 financial aid from OWWA after going through countless processes.

The missing OWWA funds – at least P21 million – have yet to be properly investigated.

Related story: Investigate Owwa for missing P21 million – Migrants group

Social burden rather than security

As such, Migrante’s Hernando said the compulsory contribution is a detriment to Filipino migrant workers.

“How could we ensure a bright future (for our families) if we could not even sustain ourselves at present?” Hernando said.

The situation is worse for returning workers, the migrant rights leader said, as the IRR requires them to pay their contributions three months in advance, or a total of P7,200 before they can start working again.

Although it was also stated that the employer and the land-based OFW would be splitting the 8 percent monthly contribution, Migrante emphasized that it would only be possible for host countries who have bilateral agreements with the Philippine government.

“Employers won’t pay for that. They would insist that it is a Philippine matter and should be settled by Filipinos,” Benitez added.

Hernando said, “rather than push OFWs to pay for social security, the government should push the employers to pay and ensure their workers’ security.” (bulatlat.com)

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By ALON SEGARRA
Bulatlat.com

“…contemporary performances seem interested in exploring the range of ways in which ‘reality’ can be produced, explored, and understood. Or, to put it another way, the ways in which ‘make-believe’ is made believable.” (C. Turner and S. Behrnt 2008: 188)

‘Sa Digma ng Halimaw, Isang Dokyu Teatro’ is neither fiction nor ‘make believe’. The documentary theater play was devised from series of interviews and the transcripts were organized and woven into narratives “about the war on drugs, told from the point of view of the families of the victims of said war and others affected by it.”

I saw the play last November 22, 2018 at the Commission of Human Rights in UP Diliman. Reminded myself that my intention was to be present. I knew what I was about to watch were real accounts of incidents, portrayed by actors and later on joined by the tellers (the voices behind the stories/monologues) narrating their stories. I had to, all throughout, been conscious of my reactions, I was aware not to take pity, but to watch with empathy and respect for their courage and strength in telling and re-telling of one of the worst day/night/weeks/months/years of their lives. Unimaginable even, that one would hope never to experience. But I also had no way of controlling my tears.

The power of the material lies in its urgency, and in the rawness and realness of the portrayal of the actors and the tellers. As an actor, I respect the courage of the families of the victims going onstage/ in front of everyone and going through trauma again and again for each performance, hoping for healing and transformation, and justice to be served. In the performances, the lives of their loved ones are handled with so much value and given meaning and their deaths exposed as inhumane and cruel. We, the audience, experienced the everyday struggles to make ends meet, yet at the end of each day, felt the love, hope for life and family. And, in an instant, life is taken away. They just become numbers, a quota to be fulfilled. We become (state) witnesses to a system/government that authorized killings, sanctioned police brutality and leaders publicly declaring no respect for human lives.

We are at war with a system that was created to protect us, work for us, and public servants who have taken their oaths and promised to be of service to the masses, the now and for future generations. But instead, the system has turned monstrous and undeniably evil and greedy, and has abandoned the poorest of the poor of society.

I believe most of them, do not ask for much. An opportunity for a decent life, a good future, a system that encourages them to be better human beings; a piece of land they can farm on their own or a piece of land to build their homes. I believe we are not asking for much, we are asking for what is just and right. Everyone deserves a better life. We demand a government that nurtures its people and not one that kills them.

At the ending, a mother shouts, cries and raises a closed fist, urging us to stand with them and continue seeking, fighting for justice; overthrow the monster in Malacanan! Names of the victims were placed all over the room. We look for them and call out their names, as if even at that moment we know them, we’ve met them and we remember them.

What do you feel after being witness to eight stories knowing that there are more than 20,000 deaths and counting and at least 20,000 more mothers, fathers, children, relatives left with nothing, feeling numb, hopeless and angry? I am confronted, assaulted with the reality that the poor, innocent lives are sacrificed for this so-called ‘war on drugs’, and any glimpse of hope or transformation is killed in an instant. One hopes that everything was just fiction, but truth is, it’s not. Even when the last sentence is said, lights fade out, we are confronted and reminded the whole time: the reality that the killings never stop, and possibly at that very moment, in another place, another victim falls, and somebody is grieving and wailing for justice.

Sa Digma ng Halimaw is necessary theater. Because truths, no matter how painful and brutal, are told. And outside the four walls, as we go out, it is necessary to fight.

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