• Home

Hope for 68 Cheated Filipino Bus Drivers Stranded in Ajman

DUBAI — The plight of the remaining 68 illegally recruited bus drivers still stranded in Ajman will be over soon. Elmer Joven, welfare officer at the Philippine Overseas Labour Office (POLO), told Khaleej Times on Tuesday that employment papers of 50 of the drivers are being processed.

While 20 of them will be joining Emirates Flight Catering Services, 20 are joining Abu Dhabi Taxi, eight Quality Mix and two an Omani company.

Only the remaining 18 are planning to return to the Philippines.

The arrangements follow Sunday’s visit of Philippine Labour Secretary Marianito D. Roque to Dubai where he met UAE government officials, which resulted in several agreements.

Speaking before Filipino workers at the Philippine Overseas Labour Office (POLO) to mark the Migrant Workers’ Day, Roque said several options had been explored with the UAE officials to end the misery of the illegally recruited bus drivers, who arrived in Ajman in January this year.

Roque told Khaleej Times that 69 of the 137 had already gone home with the help of the government, but 18 came back to Dubai as employees of Emirates Flight Catering Services.

The labour secretary refused to say how the penalties for staying beyond their visa period were settled.

It should be noted that the case of the 137 bus drivers prompted the Philippine Department of Labour (DOLE) to cancel the licence of Manila-based CYM International Recruitment and Placement Agency that recruited the bus drivers illegally promising them jobs at the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) in Dubai.

The plight of the drivers was made known to the government when their representatives met with Philippine Vice-President Noli de Castro during his April 11 visit to Dubai.

They sought assistance to go home as their tourist visas had expired and they were scavenging for food after their agency’s counterparts in the UAE deserted them without providing them employment.

The drivers were hired in Manila purportedly for the RTA at a recruitment fee of P564,000 (Dh56,400) each.

Last week, wives of the remaining stranded drivers called on Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and World Boxing Champion Manny Pacquiao to help bring their husbands back home.

As of now, three complaints have been filed against the agency and a financial firm, where the bus drivers were required to apply for loan to pay up the required recruitment fee.

One was filed before the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) to cancel the licences of CYM International and 11 other agencies.

The other is a criminal case filed at the Department of Justice for illegal recruitment and human trafficking, and a class suit is now going on before the Regional Trial Court in Manila to nullify the debts of P564,000 incurred by each of the drivers from RJJ Lacaba Financing Corp and other lending institutions.

lily@khaleejtimes.com