Monday, September 08, 2008 POEA prepares 'better plans' for KSA meet
CONFIRMING that the "unified contract" being implemented by the government of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) concerning the recruitment of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) is "onerous" and biased, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) is optimistic of coming out with a better plan for their upcoming meeting with the labor officials of KSA.
Outgoing POEA administrator Rosalinda Baldoz said the meeting with the Saudi labor delegations would discuss primarily the Gulf Cooperation Council Accredited Medical Clinics Association (GCC-Gamca) and the medical decking system and the "unified contract scheme" as well as other matters concerning the hiring of Filipino workers.
According to Baldoz, they have fully reviewed and identified the onerous provisions in the controversial unified contract; however, they have to discuss this with their Saudi counterparts to thresh out the issues.
"From our end we have identified the onerous provisions but we have to sit down with the Saudi Minister of Labor to discuss this onerous provision," Baldoz said.
"We don't know yet from their end if we have the same interpretations of the provisions...so we really have to sit down with them," she added.
She said they have requested the Saudi labor officials to include in the meeting the representatives of the Saudi National Recruitment Committee (Sanarcom) which acts as a third party in the processing of visas for Saudi bound OFWs.
Among the issues which the POEA would want to clarify with the Saudi Labor Minister, according to Baldoz, is the question on whether the involvement of Sanarcom would require collection of charges for the processing of the bond who will shoulder this fee and how much would they charge.
"These are just the initial issues that we will clarify during the meeting in October," the outgoing POEA chief said.
Baldoz said since the time of then Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas, there had been efforts to push the unified contract scheme, however, due to strong objection from the local recruitment companies, it did not materialize.
Recruitment groups such as the Philippine Association of Services Exporters Incorporated, (Pasei) earlier expressed strong opposition to the implementation of the unified contract scheme since this would definitely affect the deployment of Filipino workers to Saudi.
"The entire recruitment industry agency which was consulted by the POEA on this matter is vehemently against this arrangement since this is another attempt of the Sanarcom to get hold of the Saudi Labor market," said Lito Soriano, a Pasei member agency deploying OFWs to Saudi Arabia.
Under the unified contract scheme, only the contract endorsed by Sanarcom will be allowed a visa by the Saudi embassy.
The embassy of Saudi issued the new ruling last July 18, which took effect last August 1, 2008.
Currently, there are an estimated 1 million OFWs in the Middle East and majority of them are in Saudi Arabia. (MSN/Sunnex)
