By Vir B. Lumicao
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Congen Tejada is asking HK to explain why the positive OFWs are now all being sent home
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The Philippine Consulate is seeking clarification from the Hong Kong government about the Immigration Department’s
removal of two newly arrived Filipino domestic workers who had tested positive
for coronavirus inspection.
This comes as a third newly arrived Filipina helper, C.A., was reportedly told by her Hong Kong agent this evening, Sept 24, that she would be
sent home after her release from hospital. The reason she got was the same as in the first two cases: their employers had reportedly backed out.
C.A. and the second to be removed, E.G.S., were both part of a batch
of 13 helpers who arrived on Sept 9. Ten of them have been found infected so
far. Five tested positive on arrival, three the next day, and another one after
a few days.
The latest to be told she would be sent home, C.A., said her doctor at Princess Margaret
Hospital in Kwai Chung told
her she should be released today but her visa had expired so she could not
leave the hospital.
Consul General Raly Tejada has expressed concern about the apparent policy shift in the Hong Kong government's stance towards newly arrived Filipino domestic helpers who test positive for Covid-19.
“We are urging the Hong Kong
government to clarify their stance so that we know what exactly is happening,”
Congen Tejada said today, Sept 24, in response to an enquiry by The SUN.
“We have contacted the HK Immigration early this week to get
clarity about this new unpronounced policy,” ConGen Tejada added.
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Deno's employment visa was not stamped, suggesting she never entered HK
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Immigration authorities sent home a newly arrived Filipina
helper, Ermelyn Deno, early morning last Saturday after she was discharged
hours earlier by doctors at Pamela
Youde Nethersole
Eastern Hospital.
Then yesterday, Sept 23, they sent home E.G.S from the Sept
9 flight, four days after she was released from Princess Margaret
Hospital. The third, C.A., is still waiting for word on when she would be picked up from the hospital and sent home.
ConGen Tejada said Immigration’s standard reply when asked
about the two removals was that the employer had backed out on both occasions,
rendering the workers jobless.
This was the same reason given to The SUN which made direct
inquiries with Immigration, after learning about Deno’s case. Two staff members
said there is no policy for removing all newly arrived FDHs who test positive,
but in Deno’s case it was her employer who backed out of their contract.
ConGen said he expressed concern about the apparent policy
shift, but the Immigration authorities said in response that they would meet
with other concerned agencies first, like the Health Department, before making
a definitive comment.
ConGen Tejada said the Consulate has reported the matter to
both the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Labor and
Employment in Manila.
On the other hand, he said Hong Kong has not raised issue with
the big number of Filipino domestic workers who test positive on arrival
despite presenting a negative result for Covid-19 before departing Manila.
“Hong Kong has not made any
formal complaints to our government,” the top Filipino government official here
said.
“They already put us on a watchlist of high risk countries
and put additional measures to ensure that our workers are Covid-free before
arriving in Hong Kong such as mandatory Covid test
72 hours before leaving the country and 14 days hotel booking for the mandatory
quarantine,” he said.
E.G.S., the second removal case in four days, said that like
Deno, she and the 12 others from her batch who were deployed by the same agency
in Manila, were sent to the Lung Center
of the Philippines
for their swab test on Sept 7.
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| E.G.S's negative test result. All 3 infected OFWs were cleared by the Lung Center |
They all received their negative test results at the airport
on the evening of Sept 8, which took just over 24 hours. E.G.S. said she paid Php5,980
for the test.
The first two cases were brought to The SUN’s attention by
Marites Palma, founder of the Social Justice for Migrant Workers. Palma, who is also a
contributor to The SUN, said she immediately informed the Philippine Overseas
Labor Office and Overseas Workers Welfare Administration about Deno’s case.
But Labor Attaché Melchor Dizon, who heads Polo, has so far
remained silent on the two removal cases.
Deno was quietly taken by Immigration to the airport,
straight from her release from Eastern
Hospital on Saturday
morning, Sept 19. She arrived on Sept. 12 and sent to the hospital the next day after testing positive.
Before being taken to the hospital, she was made to sign a recognizance paper with
instructions to go straight to the airport for her flight home after her release.
However, Immigration staff told The SUN Deno was removed
because she had no right to remain in Hong Kong
after her prospective employer backed out due to her infection.
For E.G.S., this would have been her first stint in Hong
Kong after working for eight years in Singapore. She said she was
recruited by Placewell International Services Corp in Manila,
which charged her Php45,000 for the Hong Kong
job.
E.G.S. said she was shocked when a female staff of her agency
here, Golden Full (HK) Ltd, told her on Sept 20 that her employer had cancelled
her contract and she would be sent home.
She said the agency staff told her it was Immigration policy
for incoming foreign helpers who test positive for Covid-19 upon arrival. The
owner of Golden Full, which recruited her, reiterated this in a message to E.G.S.
“This is law of HK. You must go home immediately after
discharge from hospital,” the agency owner said in a message.
He and his staff told E.G.S. her employer backed out because
she has a four-month-old baby who could be put at risk because of the maid's infection.
The Immigration officer who asked E.G.S. to sign some
documents before her departure reportedly gave the same answer when she asked
why she was being sent home.
She was discharged the next day and moved to a quarantine
center where she was told to wait for her flight to Manila. The agency bought her an air ticket
and on the evening of Sept 22, she was driven to the airport. She left early the next day via Hong Kong Airlines.
An Immigration officer gave back her passport, its visa page
unstamped, after E.G.S. signed some
documents the contents of which she said could no longer remember.
To compound her woes, E.G.S. was handed a luggage which, she
found to her dismay on arrival in Manila,
belonged to another Filipina Covid patient.
