TODAY, April 13, starts the casting of votes of almost two million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who are registered voters. As they cast their votes, we remind migrant workers to carefully discern who among the candidates they should support and vote for this midterm elections.
Most of the registered voters work in Saudi Arabia, United States, Singapore, and Hong Kong. Hong Kong is the most vote-rich OFW destination with 87,000 registered voters.
OFWs must vote for candidates who value them and their contribution to the nation’s economy, and to look for candidates who prioritize their welfare and ensure protection of their rights in and out of the country and do not see them as mere products to earn from.
In 2018 OFW remittances hit $32.21 billion, an all-time high record. Personal remittances accounted for 9.7 percent of gross domestic product and 8.1 percent of gross national income in 2018. Almost 79 percent of total cash remittances in 2018 came from OFWs working or living in United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Japan, the United Kingdom, Qatar, Canada, Germany and Hong Kong.
For the longest time, the Philippine government, through its labor export policy, encourages Filipinos to work abroad. According to BaBaE! Network member Center for Women’s Resources, more than 5,000 Filipinos leave every day to work overseas and of these, 60 percent are women. Like women employed here in the country, majority of the female migrants or 76 percent work as service workers.
Despite their economic contributions to the country, many OFWs are in crises and could hardly get support from the government. According to government records, there is an increasing number of deaths reported from 82 in 2016 to 103 in 2017. In 2016 alone, there have been 1,447 cases of maltreatment, 2959 cases of contract violation, 227 cases of sexual abuses, and 63 cases of rape committed against Filipino workers.
We emphasize the need for candidates to recognize the plight of OFWs and they should provide tangible measures to protect workers overseas. But more importantly, candidates must also have long-term plans of generating decent jobs with living wage in the country so that workers may not need to leave their loved ones to earn.
