JEDDAH, 13 December 2002 — Despite the numerous objections against a proposed law to allow overseas Filipinos to vote in Philippine national elections, a senior congressman is hopeful that practical solutions could be worked out.
“We hope to organize the first voting exercise for overseas Filipinos in the election of the national president in 2004,” said Rep. Benasing Macarambon Jr., who stressed that OFWs should not be denied their right of suffrage.
Macarambon, one of the representatives of Lanao del Sur province and a member of the House committee on foreign affairs, on Wednesday said the absentee voting bill is as good as passed and the only task to be done is to reconcile the conflicting provisions of the Senate and House versions of the measure.
He said the specific mechanism for implementing absentee voting in overseas countries, including the Kingdom, would be worked out once it becomes law.
“My current exercise is to get the views of the community on the issue and then discuss them at the bicameral conference committee,” Macarambon said in a dialogue with members of the Filipino community at the Philippine Consulate General here in Jeddah.
Should the Senate version be adopted, all overseas Filipinos who are qualified to vote under the measure would participate in Philippine elections for president, vice president, senators, party-list representatives and in referendums and plebiscites.
On worries about where to get money to finance the holding of such elections abroad, Macarambon said he was confident the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) would be able to handle the exercise with its own budgetary allocation.
He was speaking on the premise that embassy or consulate personnel would be allowed to actively take part in the conduct of the elections, a proposal opposed vehemently by many legislators.
Consul General Kadatuan Usop said effort would be made to include a clause in the job contracts of maids specifying that they should be allowed to take part in voting.
He added that 32 overseas Filipino international schools across the world that were directly or indirectly related to the Philippine missions could also be considered as likely venues.
A Kasapi representative pointed out that the organization had been working on the issue of absentee voting for the past seven years.
Social welfare
In another portion of the dialogue, a top official of the Philippine Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) expressed hopes that the welfare of stranded female OFWs who are housed in the consulate would now be addressed properly with the presence of a female social worker.
Undersecretary Omera D. Lucman introduced social worker Fatima Abubakr as a direct appointee of the DSWD and whose primary task is to provide guidance and counseling to distressed OFWs.
Fatima was among seven social workers assigned to Philippine missions in the Kingdom, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.
Also sent abroad as part of the program were medical doctors.
Lucman said the deployment of social workers in places where there is a large concentration of OFWs is part of the Arroyo government’s program to provide protection and welfare to overseas workers.
Undersecretary Lucman said she took pride that she was the first Muslim to be appointed as DSWD’s undersecretary.
“This is one way of expressing that the present administration under the presidency of Gloria Arroyo is interested in mainstreaming the Muslim populace in our own country,” she added.
The OWWA Center at the consulate has one of the biggest population of stranded female OFWs. Its biggest competitor is the Bahay Kalinga in Riyadh.
