Helping OFW kids
PEOPLE want to believe that any move to improve the overseas employment program hinges on the greater consideration that reforms should benefit the families of migrant workers.
This is why, in the view of many, everybody must support a snowballing move in the 24-member Senate to set up Migrant Workers’ Family Centers (MWFCs) in various parts of the Philippines.
The families left behind by overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) must be assisted by the government, according to neophyte Senator Mark Villar’s Senate Bill (SB) No. 1527.
The proposed legislation – The Left Behind Household of Migrant Workers Act – noted that the children of OFWs are deprived of parental attention during their formative years.
And studies show that children of Filipino migrant workers experience a vast range of poor physical and mental health due to long separation from their parents.
We share the view of Senator Villar that the OFW children’s psychological needs of belongingness and intimacy are fully challenged because of physical separation.
As envisioned, the proposed family centers are mandated to provide much-neeed welfare assistance and counselling services to the families of Filipino migrant workers.
Under the proposed law, the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW), headed by Secretary Susan “Toots” Ople, is tasked to set up family centers in towns and cities.
“Lalong-lalo na sa mga lugar na kung saan maraming pamilya ang may mga kamag-anak na nagtatrabaho sa labas ng Pilipinas,” according to a former migrant worker in Iraq.
Thus, lawmakers must speed up the passage of the proposed “Left Behind Household of Migrant Workers Act.”
