More than 22,000 overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) stranded in quarantine facilities in Metro Manila have been sent home to their provinces, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) said Saturday.
President Rodrigo Duterte had ordered that all 24,000 stranded OFWs should be sent home in one week using all available government resources.
Five days since the President gave the directive, the Labor Undersecretary Claro Arellano, citing a report from the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA), said that as of 6 a.m. May 30, a total of 22,426 stranded OFWs have been released from quarantine facilities.
Of the number, 19,042 were transported between May 25 to 28 and 3,384 were brought home on May 29 alone.
OWWA provided 159 buses for transportation while some were transported by sea and air, according to the DOLE.
Some of the OFW’s relatives likewise fetched their OFWs from the hotels and quarantine facilities, it said.
DOLE noted that all the Filipino migrant workers sent home tested negative for COVID-19.
Arellano said that the DOLE will do its best to transport all the remaining OFWs from the quarantine facilities to the provinces before the deadline set by the President.
He also said OWWA had so far spent over P700 million for the repatriation, transport, accommodation and food of the more than 30,000 returning OFWs./Stacy Ang
