Government aiming to facilitate return of 70,000 to 80,000 more workers MANILA: More than 300,000 overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) have been repatriated by the government in the past 10 months, with plans to facilitate the return of thousands more who have been impacted by the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in their host countries, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said on Monday. The DFA statement added that 13,537 OFWs had been brought home last week, the highest weekly total since repatriation efforts began in February. “This is the biggest repatriation effort in the history of the DFA and of the Philippines,” Sarah Lou Arriola, DFA undersecretary for Migrant Workers’ Affairs, said in a statement. “We thank the indefatigable efforts of our DFA personnel who have been working 24/7 since February. We also thank our Foreign Service Posts and our partner government agencies for their invaluable contribution to the DFA’s repatriation efforts,” she added. With the latest arrivals, the number of overseas Filipino returnees reached 300,838, out of which 90,621 are sea-based workers, while 210,217 (69.88 percent) worked on the land. One of the 59 flights facilitated by the DFA in the past week was a Philippine Airlines chartered flight, which transported 319 distressed Filipino workers from Dammam, Saudi Arabia. It was the fifth DFA-chartered flight to repatriate stranded Filipinos from Saudi Arabia’s eastern region. The department, through its embassy in Port Moresby, also assisted in the safe return of OFWs from the Solomon Islands, while a collaboration with the Philippine Embassy in Amman resulted in the successful repatriation of 18 Filipinos from Jordan. The DFA assured Filipinos who remain stranded abroad that the agency was working “doubly hard to ensure they will be given a chance to return to the Philippines.” In a televised interview on Friday, Overseas Workers Welfare Administration Administrator Hans Cacdac said the government aimed to repatriate 70,000 to 80,000 more OFWs by the end of the year. He added that the number could go higher as more OFWs sought to be home during the holiday season. Upon their arrival in the Philippines, all returnees are being aided by the government to travel back to their respective provinces. At the same time, OFWs whose employment was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic are given a one-time cash assistance of P10,000 ($200) under the Department of Labor and Employment’s “Abot-Kamay ang Pagtulong” program. The government has allocated P1.8 billion to benefit repatriated OFWs and those in the host country. Also, the government will be providing a one-time educational, financial assistance of P30,000 to student dependents of displaced or deceased OFWs as well. Last week, the government partnered with a private company to help OFWs resume normalcy by giving them access to livelihood assistance to establish a small business, such as sari-sari stores, eateries, meat-processing units, water-refilling station, and farms to raise livestock.