DAMMAM, 27 April — The decision of the Philippine Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) on whether to continue administering licensure examinations abroad will hinge on the opinion of the Department of Justice.

PRC chairwoman Antonieta Fortuna-Ibe said she sought the DOJ's comment amid a clamor by Overseas Filipino Workers for the commission to continue with overseas exams. In a letter to a group of Filipino engineers and accountants called the United Philippine Professional Associations in Saudi Arabia (UPPASA), Fortuna-Ibe said that "the conduct of examinations abroad is not in conformity with the regulatory laws and policies of the commission and the laws of the various professional regulatory boards."

Ibe's letter was in reply to a petition sent by UPPASA to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and the PRC requesting for a continuation of the overseas exams.

UPPASA is composed of four professional organizations in the Kingdom, which are the Philippine Society of Mechanical Engineers (PSME), the Institute of Integrated Electrical Engineers (IIEE), the Philippine Institute of Civil Engineers (PICE), and the Philippine Institute of Certified Public Accountants (PICPA).

Should the PRC grant the request, the examinations would be held simultaneously in the Kingdom in October.

The PRC started conducting licensure tests abroad in 1996, catering first to Filipino teachers who have gone to work as maids in Hong Kong due to lack of employment opportunities at home. The examinations were later expanded to include engineers in the Kingdom.

Ibe, however, said the PRC's legal department had warned that the commission has no authority to hold such overseas tests. The warning is considered significant because should someone challenge the legal basis of the examinations held in the past, those who passed could be affected.

"Although we had conducted examinations outside the country in the past, we deemed it necessary to make a study on pertinent regulatory laws and issuances of the commission to determine if the conduct of examinations abroad is supported with legal basis," Ibe explained in her letter to UPPASA.

IIEE president Roberto Mabulay, however, said he was still hoping that the PRC would find some ways to grant their request.

"PRC had this program launched in the past years and we pray that they still continue to conduct this exams in the Kingdom as part of the Philippine government's outreach programs to OFWs," Mabulay said. IIEE has 140 electrical engineers expected to take the exam this year.

PICE president Fernando Bibat, whose group has 65 civil engineers raring to take the special licensure test, suggested that PRC should also consider giving special examinations in Manila to vacationing OFWs at any given month of the year if holding the exams outside the Philippines is not permitted.

Renato Briones, president of PICPA, said his group prefers the exams to be conducted in the Kingdom. It is the first time the accountants will join this program initiated by PRC years ago.

PICPA said there are 65 members willing to take the exams this year. Ironically, the PRC chair who is at the center of the controversy is, is herself the head of the commission's Board of Accountancy.

Dr. Ed Malagapo, founding chairman of PSME and the overall coordinator of UPPASA, said that they were hoping that the DOJ would would favor the interest of OFWs.

Though UPPASA still has high hopes that the special licensure in the kingdom will pursue this year, they were sad to note on what the PRC chief had written them.

In their petition, OFWs said they were sad to note that the special licensure exams were being scrapped during the term of President Arroyo, when it was approved by her predecessors, Fidel Ramos and Joseph Estrada, as recommended by the PRC.

They noted that canceling the overseas exams was a bad way of treating OFWs, which the government itself had been repeatedly praising as "new heroes."

Ibe, in her letter to UPPASA, acknowledged the deluge of requests for consideration from OFWs. But she said: "Regulatory Laws can not be compromised on the basis of clamors from overseas examinees who are only temporarily staying abroad in view of their employment."