THE Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) chief said on Thursday the guidelines for the deployment of 15,000 to 20,000 overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) to Guam would be released in November or December this year.
POEA Administrator Jennifer Jardin Manalili said in a press conference the agency is finalizing the rules and regulations for the deployment to craft a standard contract for workers who will be hired to work in Guam.
“The guidelines will hopefully be out by the end of the year, around November or December. We foresee that there will be a surge of OFWs who would want to go to Guam,” Manalili said.
Guam is offering construction work to foreign workers who could earn as much as $17 an hour, Guam senator-adviser Alfredo Antolin Jr. said.
No recruitment fee will be collected from aspiring workers but a service fee of up to $1,000 will be collected from the construction companies that will hire foreign workers.
However, recruitment consultant Emmanuel Geslani said the standard employment contract of the POEA, which insists on free food and accommodation for the OFWs, is contrary to Guam labor laws.
The Guam labor laws, which are patterned after the US mainland laws, state that food and accommodation should be shouldered by workers, similar to what is practiced in all the US states.
Geslani expressed the fear that if the contractors from Guam will shoulder the $400 airfare and a visa fee of $1,000 for a H2-B temporary working visa, the companies might be “turned off” and hire Americans instead.
“Therefore, it would be easier to hire jobless American nationals or other foreign workers who are from the mainland or can fly in on their own airfare and without the need of a visa and no service fee is involved. So, no additional costs are involved if the contractor hires [jobless] American nationals who now number 2.5 million mostly in the construction and home industry,” Geslani said.
“The hiring rules are the same as in the US, which [pay] on a per hour [basis] and Filipinos will receive the same pay as the Americans. So why hire a Filipino if you can hire an American at no cost to you? This is what recruitment leaders are saying. There is no advantage in hiring Filipinos. In fact, it is a disadvantage to contractors or subcontractors who will work on the expansion of the Andersen Air Force Base in Guam,” he added.
A proposed bill, the 2010 National Defense Authorization Act, to the United States House Representatives, 70-percent of jobs in Guam are reserved for American citizens. Written by Sara Fabunan / Business Mirror Correspondent
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