At around 8 o’clock this morning, Fort and I went to the NAIA Terminal 1 to witness the joyous and tearful reunion between the 23 crew members of hijacked MT Stolt Strength and their wives. Mario Antonio, head of the OWWA’s repatriation assistance division, deftly handled the homecoming arrangements.
The Blas F. Ople Policy Center [...]
Just as we were starting to see streaks of light and life in a moribund global economy, Mexico was zapped with swine flu and now the world is feeling the shakes from a possible pandemic.
The implications of a swine flu pandemic on our own little corner of the world are enormous.
Right now, international travel is [...]
The Blas F. Ople Policy Center issued a press release today proposing a program on conditional cash transfers to help children of displaced OFWs stay in school. The cash transfers will be contingent on the following conditions: 1) enrollment this coming schoolyear; and, 2) monthly medical check-ups for children enrolled in this program.
The text [...]
My good friend Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Esteban Conejos has proposed mandatory psychiatric tests for departing OFWs. I know that he means well but I vehemently disagree with this proposal for the following reasons:
1. When an OFW particularly a household worker is pushed to the wall by an insane or callous employer, he or she is [...]
Press Release
Issued July 24, 2008
The Blas F. Ople Center raised an alert on the growing number of cases involving the trafficking of Filipino women to Malaysia as it called on local governments to help stamp out human trafficking.
According to the Ople Center, local “scouts†of Malaysian syndicates and recruiters have been penetrating residential areas particularly [...]
Ambassador Lauro Baja, esteemed diplomat and foreign affairs expert, should just let the law take its full course. In today’s Inquirer, the good ambassador insinuated that the human trafficking charges levied against him by his former maid who worked for the Baja family in New York City for two months may be a result of [...]
The Blas F. Ople Policy Center issued this press release today:
The Blas F. Ople Policy Center (BFO Center) said the country should have a reintegration plan in place for thousands of returning Filipinos as the Malaysian government and state officials of Sabah gear up for a massive crackdown on illegal workers in the island [...]
I am happy. Today.
The DFA is finally putting up an embassy in Syria.
It’s in the news.
This has been the advocacy of the Blas F. Ople Policy Center ever since we
knocked on the DFA’s doors in behalf of human trafficking victims who wanted to come home after suffering maltreatment and abuse from their [...]
It’s thirty minutes past midnight. Am here at the airport terminal in Kuala Lumpur waiting for boarding time. The airport I am in has free WiFi. This is where budget fare flights like that of Cebu Pacific’s take off and land. A cafe espresso sells giant donuts a few feet from where I sit while [...]
Ever since I wrote in my column and in this blog about potential jobs in Canada, I’ve been getting a steady stream of resumes from readers of Our Times. I really am grateful for the trust and confidence but don’t want to raise people’s hopes unfairly especially since I’m really just a conduit of information. [...]
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