MANILA, 15 November 2002 — Fifty-four foreign employers will receive the appropriate recognition for their laudable treatment of overseas Filipino workers at the Labor Department’s First International Employer Awards (FIEA) later this month.

DOLE Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas said the awards are being given in recognition of the efforts and significant roles of foreign principals and employers who have promoted the continued employment of OFWs and have advanced the interests of the Philippines in the field of land-based manpower deployment.

“With the First International Employers Awards, the Philippine government serves notice to foreign employers that we recognize their contribution to our overseas employment program through their continuous hiring of our overseas workers,” she said.

Fifteen of the employers will receive Presidential Awards of Distinction from President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and 39 others will get DOLE International Employers Awards from Sto. Tomas.

“It is time that we recognize and honor the employers who trust and recognize our overseas workers,” Sto. Tomas explained.

Recipients of the DOLE International Employers Awards include 34 land-based foreign employers in the Middle East, nine in Europe, 4 in the USA and trust territories, and 7 in Asia.

Of those employers who will get the presidential citation, eight are from the Middle East, four are from the US and trust territories. Two are from Europe and one is from Asia.

One of the DOLE awardees is the Arab Shipbuilding and Repair Yard Co. of Bahrain which has employed 1,947 Filipino workers since 1992. Currently, the company employs 297 OFWs representing 51 percent of its workforce, 90 percent of whom belong to the skilled category consisting of electricians, welders, riggers, platers, mechanical fitters, supervisors, and gas safety inspectors.

One of the presidential awardees is the Saudi Arabian Oil Company (Saudi Aramco) which has employed 11,000 Filipinos and continues to give a generous package of employment benefits to its workers. The awards were launched in September when Sto. Tomas said she had already received nominations for awards.

She said then that the outstanding employers would be chosen based on the official records of the DOLE’s attached agencies, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA), the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) and the Philippine embassies abroad.

Labor Undersecretary Manuel Imson said “the award will help catalyze and promote the best practices on human resources working to reinforce stability and growth in accordance with internationally recognized and accepted conventions and standards.”

POEA Administrator Rosalinda Baldoz said that employers are chosen on the basis of the number of OFWs that particular employer has hired, the quality of the employment, and his preference for Filipino workers.

“The awards will be given for employers who have treated Filipinos very well,” Sto. Tomas said.

She also said many employers abroad have an obvious preference for Filipino workers. “We are number one in terms of availability of skilled workers, number three in terms of competent senior managers, number four in terms of skills in finance. We are number 14th in information technology,” Sto. Tomas said.

In addition to honoring the qualified employers, Sto. Tomas said the awards “will highlight the quality and performance of Filipinos which can entice other employers to hire Filipino labor.”

According to Imson, the awards will hopefully generate more employment opportunities for Filipinos abroad since it is a fact of life that local jobs are scarce.

“Our policy is to find Filipino workers jobs here but the reality is we will just have to get our workers the best jobs overseas,” Imson said.

Abdulkhair “Bong” Guro, a former chairman of the Kasapi Congress based in Jeddah, was not impressed by the DOLE’s new program, saying it only duplicates the presidential awards held by the Commission of Filipinos Overseas (CFO) every two years.

“There is a category in these awards for employers but there is just too much cheating in these awards,” Guro told Arab News.

He said there have been some employers who give generously to Filipino community groups as well as to their OFW employees “but never get to win awards.”

Rashid Fabricante, also an OFW leader in Riyadh said that the intention is good because “its high time to recognize employers (foreign-based) who for the last 30 years of OFW diaspora has provided the OFWs sustained income, upgraded their skills and were able to excel in their professions contributing to the growth of the company and a source of pride for the country.”

But he said OFWs are questioning the awards because of the criteria for choosing the winners.

“What parameters are used to nominate or confer them these awards?” Fabricante asked.

“Why not post them in the message board and let the OFW employees judge them?” Fabricante suggested, adding,”at the same time why not identify also the blacklisted recruitment agencies back home especially those agencies who continue to deploy people?”