By Joseph B.A. Marzan
Western Visayas Regional Task Force on COVID-19 (WVRTF) spokesperson Atty. Roy Villa said concerns raised at the Overseas Workers’ Welfare Administration (OWWA) Region 6 had been resolved during their meeting on the same day.
On Friday, Villa had floated the idea that the WVRTF might resolve to pursue administrative and criminal charges against the agency after five repatriated Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) who arrived in Iloilo on April 29 tested positive for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
The results from the Reverse Transcription-Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) tests were confirmed by the Department of Health (DOH) over the weekend.
The five, which included one OFW from Guimaras and four from Iloilo City, were part of seven OFWs who initially tested positive in the rapid antibody testing.
All OFWs from Iloilo province, Iloilo City and Guimaras have been quarantined since their arrival in a hotel in the city.
The positive tests prompted the WVRTF in its meeting on April 30 to recommend the suspension of OFW repatriations to Western Visayas.
The recommendation will be forwarded to the National Inter-Agency Task Force on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (NIATFMEID).
Villa said the WVRTF has discussed their concerns with the OWWA-6 and the latter claimed they had resolved doubts as to their capacity to handle the repatriation.
He added that the WVRTF has set up a group that will handle the next batches of arriving OFWs.
“That’s precisely what we discussed, and that’s why we met. We’ve resolved the doubts with the OWWA and we’ve done the tasking. Hopefully, after this, we would be clear that we wouldn’t have any more doubts and problems wouldn’t arise the next time around because we’ve given specific assignments. We’ve also set up a Sub-Task Group which will be responsible for the next batches of our OFWs,” Villa said.
OWWA-6 Officer-in-Charge Lea Aguirre was absent from the meeting but she sent a representative.
Villa said that the OWWA had assigned personnel during the meeting to take care of the necessary food and other supplies needed by the OFWs.
He declined to specify the assigned tasks and to whom these were assigned.
“During the meeting with the [WVRTF], we fixed the supplies and food provisions of our OFWs. There have been personnel assigned by the OWWA to take care of these things. [Iloilo Governor Arthur Defensor Jr.] and [Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas] were there, and so was our [WVRTF] chairman, [Office of Civil Defense Regional] Director [Jose Roberto] Nuñez. We’ve resolved the necessities that we’ve had problems with recently. The incident that happened where there was no food and other necessities delivered to our OFWs, it wouldn’t happen again. Hopefully, we won’t encounter problems in relation to this,” he said.
NEW OWWA DIRECTOR
Daily Guardian also received reports that OWWA administrator Hans Leo Cacdac has appointed Rizza Moldes as the new Regional Director of the OWWA-6.
Moldes will serve as concurrent head of both the regional office in Iloilo City and the OWWA extension office in Bacolod City starting today, May 4.
Daily Guardian has reached out to Cacdac for further confirmation and details but he did not respond.
MAYOR, GUV RAISE CONCERNS
During the WVRTF meeting, Mayor Treñas once again blew his top against OWWA for purported lack of coordination.
He did not mince words in expressing his anger.
“When you send OFWs to us here, you don’t coordinate with us. When there is something to be done here, fingers are being pointed at the city and the province. You don’t even ask about our preparedness! Who are we, your servants? Look at what you did, it’s a mess! Who’s going to pay for the hotel [accommodation of the OFWs]? Are we just going to look at each other here? Nobody seems to know anything. Don’t slip up!” He said.
He also directed his ire at Aguirre’s absence from the meeting, saying her presence was important to clear the issues.
“That’s how important it is that she should be here but she hasn’t shown up to a meeting this big. This wasn’t supposed to be our problem, but that of the OWWA and the [Maritime Industry Authority] because they were the ones who allowed the entry of the OFWs, but then again we’re now here. We are here. Let’s just look for a solution because we’re already in the situation. Whether we like it or not, [the newly-confirmed COVID-19 cases] are the city’s residents,” he said.
The mayor has repeatedly thrown pot-shots at OWWA over its repatriation processes after an OFW resident of La Paz district was confirmed to have contracted COVID-19 in early April.
Speaking to the press after the meeting, the mayor said that he was pleased with the outcome but reiterated his displeasure over the handling of the repatriations.
“This is what is coordination is about, so we can identify what needs to be done. What [the OWWA] did for this batch, they kept forcing. They kept pushing and we eventually accepted it. When they arrived, it happened that they were not able to have their food delivered to them and we had to channel our resources towards them. Until there’s no proper coordination, we will be having difficulty. I feel sad for the OFWs who were untimely sent back here. Now, there were five who tested positive. The [WVRTF] should sit down and discuss this matter because this is a health concern and they were neglected by the OWWA and the MARINA. For me, I’m not satisfied if they would do that, bring the OFWs there and just leave them be. I’m not satisfied by the lack of attention given to the OFWs,” he said.
Treñas said that the city government will continue to provide support to the quarantined OFWs.
“The city government is continuously providing [the OFWs] with food. It’s not a problem with me if we have to do that for 14 days. Accommodations are shouldered by the OWWA, as they should. If they escape from this responsibility, they will get a beating from me. The medicines, DOH. That’s why it’s called an Inter-Agency Task Force because each agency has a task. I talked to [Cebu Governor Gwendolyn Garcia] recently, and she said the OWWA there were the ones to pay for the hotels. Why would the OWWA here make an escape? My understanding is that the OWWA has a budget of P10,000 per OFW,” he said.
In the same press interview, Governor Defensor struck a similar tone, saying that while he and the mayor would want to see OFWs reunited with their families at this time, he also needs to take care of the province.
“Our worst fear had happened. We raised concerns over sending our Ilonggo OFWs home. I’d like to repeat that we love our OFWs and we want them to be home with their families as much as possible. I’d also like to repeat that with that, we have an obligation that they wouldn’t be able to make their families sick, and that’s what we’re doing in the province. In the event that there would be a positive case [from our OFWs], it means that those sent here would have a positive case, which only used to be a mere possibility. We’ve seen from the beginning that there were two positive cases from returning OFWs, and then what had happened with the new cases from Iloilo City and Guimaras and results from those who are residents of the province hadn’t come out yet then there are positive cases yet again,” he said.
The governor also reiterated his previous statements from the past month, saying that it was imperative for the OFWs to take tests before returning to their homes.
“It’s the [WVRTF] recommending to [the NIATFMEID] to stop the return of the OFWs for the meantime because we are compromising so many things, the quarantine of the province, the city, and the whole country because Metro Manila is the ground zero of the pandemic. It’s not fundamentally sound for us to disperse the people because that’s the nature of quarantine, you don’t move so it will not spread. We see what’s happening to us here, so hopefully, this would stop so we can fix this by having [the OFWs] undergo the [RT-PCR] testing. Even if they did undergo the [RT-PCR] test they would be at risk because [Metro Manila] is an area of local transmission, there will still be risks of [an OFW] coming home here. But we can lessen the risk if they would take the tests in Manila,” he said.
