Philippine diplomat sent to Saudi Arabia to lead search for missing woman

Diosalyn Fabian Seva

JEDDAH: Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has sent a special representative to Saudi Arabia to lead the search for a Filipino woman who has been reported missing for more than a year.
Mohammed Noordin Pendosina Lomondot, a special assistant at the Office of Migrant Workers’ Affairs, Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), identified the missing worker as Diosalyn Fabian Seva, 36, a mother of two young children.
Lomondot, who once served as Philippine consul general in Jeddah, said Seva quit her job as teacher at Dupax Del Norte High School in Nueva Vizcaya, northern Philippines, to try her luck as a maid in Saudi Arabia. She arrived in the Kingdom in October 2015 and was supposed to work for a family in Jazan, but was later sent to another family in Jeddah.
Information gathered by DFA investigators in Manila showed that Seva last sent money to her family in February 2016 and was not heard from since.
In a series of interviews in Jeddah, Lomondot said he had contacted the owner of the Saudi partner agency of the Philippine recruiter and was told that Seva ran away from her sponsors.
“We are coordinating with concerned local authorities to help locate Mrs. Seva. At the same time, I am calling on members of the Filipino community in the Kingdom and others who know the whereabouts of Diosalyn Seva to please contact us,” he said.
He also asked Seva “to contact the consulate if she is just around.”
Anyone who has helpful information may contact the Philippine Consulate’s Assistance to Nationals Section via e-mail, [email protected], or by calling its hotline number 0555219613, he said.
Videos shared by Lomondot’s team showed the son and daughter of Seva crying, worried that they will never see their mother again.
In another video, Seva’s mother, Lourdes Fabian, said she was “always praying to God that her daughter is still alive.”
Fabian said she was afraid of what fate has befallen her daughter.
She said her daughter is a very responsible mother and would have contacted her children if she could.
Lomondot said Duterte took special interest in the case of Seva after learning about it from the missing woman’s brother, an army soldier who was wounded in a clash with militants in the southern Philippines.