Migrant workers group initiates survey on OWWA
A migrant advocacy group is spearheading consultations on reforming the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) in hopes of making it more responsive to overseas Filipinos workers (OFWs).
Ellene Sana, executive director of the Center for Migrant Advocacy (CMA), appealed to all OFWs, including OFW returnees, to answer the on-line survey which will be in both English and Filipino.
“OWWA is your organization. It was created for your protection and holds a fund for your benefit! Therefore, your opinion on OWWA is very important in deciding what OWWA should be,” Sana told abs-cbnNEWS.com.
Answers to the survey will form part of the CMA’s recommendations on a draft legislative proposal to restructure OWWA and make it responsive to the needs of OFWs.
She said that “for over a decade, OFWs have been campaigning for OWWA to restructure its organization.”
“In 2003, OWWA unilaterally promulgated new Omnibus Policies. Since 2004 PMRW (Philippine Migrants Rights Watch), other groups and the OFWs have been battling the OWWA Board in court, challenging the legal premise of the Omnibus Policies and trying to make OWWA serve the needs of our OFWs,” she said.
The case is up for resolution by the Supreme Court.
Meantime, Sana said the CMA and its sister organizations worldwide, including the Migrant Forum in Asia and the PMRW, are initiating this new campaign “to draft a legislative proposal to replace the Omnibus Policies and to restructure the OWWA organization.”
The survey includes 40 short questions answerable by yes or no.
Anti-people policies
The OWWA Omnibus Policies were formulated and approved by the OWWA board in 2003. Since then, migrant advocates have called these policies anti-poor.
Under the Omnibus policies, membership in OWWA and its accompanying benefits are restricted only to paying members, whereas before, even former OFWs and OFW family members were included in the agency’s membership.
Former CPCP-ECMI (Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ Ecumenical Commission on Migrants and Itinerant Peoples) head Bishop Ramon Arguelles and president of the Philippine Migrants Rights Watch Carmelita Nuqui have said these policies have “practically reduced the number of beneficiaries by restricting its services to active members.”
“The returnees, or those who have contributed to the OWWA funds while working abroad, can no longer access OWWA services under the Omnibus Policies,” they said in a letter to then Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas and then OWWA Administrator Virgilio Angelo.
“Worse, membership is confined until the effectivity of the contract, which means illegally terminated OFWs are no longer OWWA members. Rather than abandon them, government should provide more services to illegally terminated OFWs,” the letter said.
Migrants and migrant advocates would later file a case questioning the authority of OWWA to continue collecting the membership fee of $25 as well as the Omnibus Policies.
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