DAMMAM, 26 October 2003 — The Philippine Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) has scheduled the licensure examinations for Filipino professionals in the Kingdom in February, Arab News learned yesterday.
Murry Demdam, outgoing president of the Philippine Society of Mechanical Engineers in Saudi Arabia (PSME-SA), said PRC chief Antonietta Fortuna-Ibe called last week to tell him that the examinations will be conducted at the Philippine Embassy in Riyadh.
The commission is now preparing the procedures on the implementation of the examinations and the exact date will be announced later, Demdam quoted Fortuna-Ibe as saying.
Demdam, the current chairman of the Philippine Professional Organizations (PPO) in the Kingdom, said the examinations will be given to accountants, civil engineers, mechanical engineers and electrical engineers.
The PPO is composed of the PSME, the Institute of Integrated Electrical Engineers (IIEE), Philippine Institute of Civil Engineers (PICE), and the Philippine Institute of Certified Public Accountants (PICPA).
Last year, the scrapped its overseas licensure tests, citing the lack of a law providing for such exercise, and lack of budget for the travel expense of its examiners.
Fortuna-Ibe agreed to resume the tests after Senate President Franklin Drilon, acting on a request of the PPO, assured the commission that the holding of licensure examinations abroad was well within the mandate of the commission. He also allocated three million pesos out of his 2003 Priority Development Assistance Fund, better known as the pork barrel fund, to fund the program.
Demdam also went to the office of Senate President Franklin Drilon and his Demdam said when he visited Fortuna-Ibe at his office in Manila to follow-up their request, he was told that the PRC wanted at least 250 examinees from each of the professional groups and that there should be only one venue.
When told that it would be impossible to gather 1,000 examinees, the PRC agreed to lower the requirement to 150 applicants in each field, Demdam said.
He said 425 engineers and accountants all over the Kingdom had applied to take the examinations so far. Of the total, 150 are from the IIEE, 135 from PSME, 65 from PICE, and 75 from PICPA.
In the previous years, the professional groups were able to gather only around 300 applicants combined from the three engineering groups. It will be the first time for accountants to be covered, should the examinations push through next year.
“It will be a tough job for us but we will accept the challenge. We will campaign to look for other unlicensed OFWs in these four professions who are now working in the Kingdom to come out and apply for the examinations,” Demdam said.
He said that the budget allocated by Drilon will be only up to December 2004 and if PRC will not conduct the licensure next year, it will be again a problem for them to look for another budget.
The PPO will also seek help from Ambassador Bahnarim Guinomla to convince the PRC to go ahead with the examinations even if the PPO falls short of the required number of examinees, Demdam said.
