The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) Secretary Silvestre Bello III said that the ban of deploying overseas Filipino workers (OFW) to the Federated States of Micronesia may be lifted.
It can be recalled that the Philippine Overseas Employment Authority (POEA) has imposed the ban after a receiving a report that health workers in a state hospital are not being compensated properly.
Bello explained that the total deployment ban is not solely the call of the DOLE and POEA. He added that the Department of Foreign Affairs needs to make sure that the working conditions have improved.
According to Bello, they have only received one complaint of an OFW who has not received his wage and imposing a total ban is too drastic, reported Business World.
The OFW in question has not yet responded to DOLE. Once they have verified that there is only one case of non-payment, Bello promised to order the lifting of the deployment ban.
POEA’s statistics say that there are around 2,000 OFWs who are working in the Federated states of Micronesia.
