By Roy Mabasa
AFTER enduring a four-year battle with her employer who scalded her with boiling water, an overseas Filipino worker was finally reunited with her family in the Philippines Friday.
Pahima Alagasi left the Philippines in March 2014 and served as a household service worker in Riyadh but sought refuge at the Embassy two months later after she was hospitalized with serious burns she claimed she sustained after the mother of her employer poured boiling water on her back.
In a press briefing. Philippine Ambassador to Riyadh Adnan Alonto said the Philippine Embassy in Riyadh assisted Alagasi, a 30-year old single mother of two from Pikit, North Cotabato, in filing a case of maltreatment against the mother of her employer. It was however dismissed after she failed to prove her accusation.
Alagasi has been staying at the Embassy’s Bahay Kalinga shelter since then and could not return to the Philippines because her employer filed a counter case against her.
However, Ambassador Alonto said the Philippine embassy was able to secure the assistance of Saudi authorities in clearing the way for Pahima Alagasi’s return to the country.
Alonto also cited the critical role of Interior Minister Prince Abdulaziz Bin Saud Bin Naif who approved her final exit from the Kingdom after a protracted four-year legal battle with her employer.
According to Susan Ople of the Blas F. Ople Policy Center, what happened to Pahima is “a textbook case of how our intricate system of migrant workers’ protection and diplomacy failed her.”
“There are lessons to be learned here, not for nitpicking purposes, but to ensure every OFW’s right to access to justice and human rights,” Ople said in a statement.
She urged the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) to review its legal assistance and humanitarian service delivery.
