02/12/2009 | 08:21 PM
MANILA, Philippines — Proposals to resume deployment of Filipino workers to Iraq face yet another obstacle with the killing of a staff of the Philippine Embassy in Baghdad.
Vice President Noli de Castro on Thursday identified the unfortunate worker as Vergine Elias Jamil, a caretaker of the Philippine chancery since November 1985.
Jamil and two other companions were killed by unknown assailants on the night of Feb. 5, said De Castro, who is also the presidential adviser on overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).
De Castro said a Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) report gave no further details on the killings. He said the result of police investigation on the case could weigh heavily on whether the government should lift the ban on deployment of Filipinos to war-ravaged Iraq.
“We are closely coordinating with our Philippine Embassy in Baghdad as to the outcome of the Iraqi police’s investigation. This incident will be considered in our deliberation on the possible lifting of the deployment ban," De Castro said.
A team led by Ambassador Roy Cimatu, head of the Middle East Preparedness Team, will be leaving for Iraq this month to study the possibility of lifting the ban. Cimatu’s team will also visit Lebanon and Nigeria—two other countries with existing OFW ban.
“Ambassador Cimatu will reassess the security risk in these countries, whether it will be safe for OFWs to be deployed in said countries," De Castro said.
Earlier, De Castro proposed a selective ban on these countries, seeking to lift travel and deployment restrictions in areas considered as centers of economic activities and where security situation have normalized.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo stopped sending Filipino workers to Iraq following the kidnapping of a Filipino truck driver in 2004 and an accountant in 2005.
Before the ban, around 6,000 Filipinos are working in Iraq and confined inside US military camps due to the volatile security condition in the country.
But the figure, according to Iraq’s Embassy in Manila, has swelled to 15,000, most of them working for foreign companies in Iraq’s northern region. The workers reportedly entered Iraq either via the United Arab Emirates or Jordan. - GMANews.TV
...at ano naman kaya ang maiiwan natin sa susunod na henerasyon?
Friday, February 13, 2009
Election Time
Undocumented OFWs can register--Comelec
By Veronica Uy
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 18:17:00 02/12/2009
Filed Under: Overseas Employment, Elections Philippines—
Almost two weeks into the registration for overseas absentee voting, only 2,045 have enlisted in the 93 foreign posts as of February 11, the Department of Foreign Affairs said Thursday.
At the re-launch of the registration center at the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, Foreign Affairs Undersecretary for Special and Ocean Concerns Rafael Seguis said the turnout was still far from the one million target overseas registrants for the 2010 elections.
Elections Commissioner Nicodemo Ferrer said 123,220 had been de-listed from the certified list of voters of some 500,000 as of 2007 after they failed to vote in the last two polls.
He said they could enlist again during the registration period, which runs until August 31 this year.
The commissioner in charge of OAV said undocumented workers, which government estimates put at almost a million, may also register.
Seguis said he remained optimistic that with intensive information drive the one million target would be reached. He was hoping the POEA OAV registration center would enlist five to six times more than the 39,223 that it registered for 2007 polls.
Seguis, who chairs the DFA's OAV Secretariat, called on all qualified overseas Filipinos to register in the next six months and "participate in the nation's political process even if they are miles away from home."
Ferrer attributed the low turnout to the voting requirement on Filipino-Americans to return to the Philippines in three years. He said Comelec was proposing to either do away with the requirement or change it to seven years.
Asked about the problems being encountered in the overseas registration, the election official said some cameras of the data-capturing machines were breaking down.
____________________________________________________________
SHOW TIME
A clarion call to all OFWs of the Travel Banned Countries and to all our sympathizers
MAGKAISA!!!
WHO MADE US SUFFER?
WHO MADE US 'HEROES' AND THEN 'BINARIL TAYO SA LUNETA?'
Pang-munumento lang ba tayo?
By Veronica Uy
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 18:17:00 02/12/2009
Filed Under: Overseas Employment, Elections Philippines—
Almost two weeks into the registration for overseas absentee voting, only 2,045 have enlisted in the 93 foreign posts as of February 11, the Department of Foreign Affairs said Thursday.
At the re-launch of the registration center at the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, Foreign Affairs Undersecretary for Special and Ocean Concerns Rafael Seguis said the turnout was still far from the one million target overseas registrants for the 2010 elections.
Elections Commissioner Nicodemo Ferrer said 123,220 had been de-listed from the certified list of voters of some 500,000 as of 2007 after they failed to vote in the last two polls.
He said they could enlist again during the registration period, which runs until August 31 this year.
The commissioner in charge of OAV said undocumented workers, which government estimates put at almost a million, may also register.
Seguis said he remained optimistic that with intensive information drive the one million target would be reached. He was hoping the POEA OAV registration center would enlist five to six times more than the 39,223 that it registered for 2007 polls.
Seguis, who chairs the DFA's OAV Secretariat, called on all qualified overseas Filipinos to register in the next six months and "participate in the nation's political process even if they are miles away from home."
Ferrer attributed the low turnout to the voting requirement on Filipino-Americans to return to the Philippines in three years. He said Comelec was proposing to either do away with the requirement or change it to seven years.
Asked about the problems being encountered in the overseas registration, the election official said some cameras of the data-capturing machines were breaking down.
____________________________________________________________
SHOW TIME
A clarion call to all OFWs of the Travel Banned Countries and to all our sympathizers
MAGKAISA!!!
WHO MADE US SUFFER?
WHO MADE US 'HEROES' AND THEN 'BINARIL TAYO SA LUNETA?'
Pang-munumento lang ba tayo?
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