MANILA, 6 December 2007 — Two Filipinos working in Saudi Arabia are among 12 OFWs who will receive the coveted Bagong Bayani Awards for 2007, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) said yesterday.
A list obtained by Arab News from the Bagong Bayani Foundation Inc. showed the awardees to also include household service workers, a ship captain, a restaurant manager, a lecturer, an engineer, a sculptor and seafarers.
Of the 12 awardees, seven are based in the Middle East.
The awards has four categories: Most Outstanding Employee, Most Outstanding in Community and Social Service, Most Outstanding in Culture and Performing Arts, and the Blas F. Ople Natatanging Bayani Award.
The awardees from Saudi Arabia are Mary Jane Pajarillo-Tupas, director of nursing at the Mohammad Al-Dossary Hospital in Alkhobar, and Rolando Ocampo, restaurant manager in Asia Restaurant in Jeddah.
Pajarillo-Tupas is among those in the list of Most Outstanding Employees, together with Josefina Villarey, a housekeeper turned personal secretary in Kuwait; Hazel Reposo, a housekeeper in New England; Jesus Sumook, seaman at Day Star Shipping Limited; Chitael Carmona, superintendent at Refrigeration Industries and Storage in Kuwait; Vito De Raya, senior lecturer at the College of Nursing in Brunei; and Eduardo Gulmatico, a senior officer at Technip in Abu Dhabi.
Ocampo is in the Most Outstanding in Community and Social Services list, together with Francisco Roque, a landscape engineer in Kuwait.
In the Most Outstanding in Culture and the Arts category is Richard Gabriel, an artist, sculptor and painter in Italy.
The list on Unknown Category included ship captain Cuadrato Gidoc Gaspi and Roberto Abella, engineer at the First Engineering Group of Companies, Libya Branch.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo will bestow the awards to the 12 OFWs in Malacañang on Dec. 12.
Active Leader
Labor Attaché David Des T. Dicang, head of the Philippine Overseas Labor Office in the Eastern Region of the Kingdom, said Pajarillo-Tupas finished her Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) degree at St. Gabriel Hospital in Kalibo, Aklan in 1986.
She first came to Saudi Arabia in 1988 and worked as a staff nurse at the Al-Mouwasat Hospital in Dammam.
She transferred to Al-Dossary Hospital in Al-Khobar in 1993 also as a staff nurse and held various positions and was promoted nursing director in 2001.
Pajarillo-Tupas, a well known community leader in Alkhobar, is an official of the OFW Congress, the Ro-Akeanon, and the Alfidasca in the Eastern Province. She is also one of the organizers and chairwoman of the Search for Ms. Little Princess OFW, a project of the OFW Congress.
The search will conclude tomorrow at the International Philippine School in Alkhobar (IPSA).
Dr. Ronnie Molina, founder of Filpop Music Club, was said to have convinced Pajarillo-Tupas to submit her nomination to the Bagong Bayani Foundation in Manila.
The nomination was endorsed by Al-Dosssary staff, including Abdul Fattah Ennayal, the director general; Abdul Basset Al-Jezzar, operation manager; Dr. Mahmoud El Hindi, medical director; Dr. Mohamad Fahim Siddiqui, quality management director/ chief surgeon; Dr. Thalath Hussein, assistant medical director; Dr. Zuhair Al-Kayyali, chief of Ob-Gyne); Jafar Ibrahim, finance manager; and Dante Cadion, human resources in-charge.
