DEAD heroes are treated with pomp. It is not so with living heroes.
In a room of fifty five overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Shierameh Hepega, a registered nurse, had to survive the ordeal of a hellish refuge. There, she discovered, that many OFWs have been in that inhuman condition for months, if not years. Others, not so born of sterner stuff, succumbed to depression and mental illness.
Hepega is a registered nurse in the Philippines. She was hired as caregiver bound for Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. But when she was presented with the employment contract, the written stipulation was for her to work as housemaid. She confronted the manpower agency which reasoned that the contract is only for compliance with the work permits but the actual work in Riyadh would be that of a caregiver. Hesitantly, but upon representation by the manpower agency, she signed the employment contract.
She arrived in Riyadh on January 13, 2019. To her shock, she was made to clean the entire house, from the ground up to the third floor. When she protested because she was supposed to be a caregiver or private nurse, she was told that she was in that Saudi household as housemaid.
She pleaded that she be allowed a cellphone number or an internet sim card so that she could communicate freely with her family. The Saudi host refused. She left the Saudi household on January 19, 2019 and sought assistance from Philippine Overseas Labor Officials (POLO) in the Philippine Embassy.
While her case was awaiting resolution, Hepega was accommodated in Bahay Kalinga. In a room of 55 occupants, the condition was sub-human. The physical discomfort could easily translate to mental illnesses, and translate it did, at least for some. A few in that room got crazy.
To make matters worse, the manpower company that deployed could not be reached for assistance. She was left alone in that foreign land. The manpower company has deployed a Pinay who was thrown into the desert land without a lifeline.
Hepega was more fortunate than the rest. Her uncle, Fr. Stephen Olario, sought the assistance of the lawyer who immediately wrote the Office of the President, the Philippine Overseas Employment Agency (POEA), the Department of Foreign Affairs, and the manpower company MEJA International Manpower Agency Inc., pleading that she be repatriated immediately.
In a rather exceptional pace, Hepega was repatriated back to the Philippines on February 3, 2019. Apparently, the government agencies that received the letter scrambled to solve the issue, else the Office of the President would act with dispatch, and act harshly on the sleeping agencies.
Shierameh is back in the Philippines. But her nights are hounded by cries of her roommates back in Bahay Kalinga in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Her roommates have been “guests” of that small and cramped room for many months already, and the physical pain is now gnawing on their souls. With 2.3 million documented OFWs throughout the globe, and millions more undocumented workers abroad, you could just imagine the ordeal our so-called living heroes have to suffer in anonymity.
Our dead heroes deserve fitting tributes during the celebration of their heroism. They have been contributed greatly to the Filipino race.
But our living heroes deserve too our attention and care. They are our modern day Atlases that have carried our country during financial crises when our peso would have devaluated very low against the US dollars and plunge our economy in the tailspin.
Our tribute to our living heroes is simple. Take good care of their welfare wherever they are in the four corners of the globe. That we have to do while they are alive because these breed of heroes, unlike our well-known dead heroes, become anonymous when they die.