Work promised to returned maids<\/p>\n
MANILA (AFP): President Fidel Ramos promised employment
\nyesterday to 84 Filipina maids who returned from Singapore in a
\ndiplomatic row over the hanging of their compatriot Flor
\nContemplacion, and said he was ready to send a second plane there
\nif needed.<\/p>\n
He also acknowledged Singaporean cooperation in an ongoing
\nPhilippine investigation into the hanging, which has caused an
\noutcry here.<\/p>\n
The maids returned at dawn yesterday aboard a C-130 troop
\ntransport plane sent to Singapore by Ramos.<\/p>\n
Government agencies and the private sector intended to give
\nthe maids \"opportunities to have a fair chance of earning a
\ndecent living in the Philippines,\" Ramos told a news briefing.<\/p>\n
He thanked Singapore for giving court documents to Manila in
\nthe case of Contemplacion, who was hanged in Singapore March 17
\nafter her conviction on charges of strangling another maid, Delia
\nMaga, and killing Maga's four-year old Singaporean ward in 1991.<\/p>\n
\"This substantiates the Singapore government's willingness to
\ncooperate with the Philippines,\" Ramos said, adding the documents
\nwould be used by a presidential fact-finding body investigating
\nthe circumstances surrounding Contemplacion's death.<\/p>\n
Ramos has vowed to break ties with Singapore if the commission
\nfinds that Contemplacion, whom many Filipinos believe was
\ninnocent, had been unjustly hanged.<\/p>\n
Among the documents were records of preliminary inquiries, the
\ncourts' grounds of decision, and Contemplacion's petition for
\nclemency, Ramos said.<\/p>\n
Ramos said he was \"ready to send\" another plane to fetch any
\nof the 60,000 Filipina maids still in the city-state.<\/p>\n
The homecomers join a large army of 2.4 million unemployed in
\nthe Philippines, which collects up to US$8 billion a year in
\nsalary remittances from its estimated five million contract
\nworkers abroad.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, police investigators will bring the results of
\ntheir autopsy on Maga's remains to the fact-finding commission
\ntoday.<\/p>\n
The findings \"may help the commission determine the
\ncircumstances surrounding Maga's death,\" said Alberto Reyes,
\nchief of the National Bureau of Investigation's (NBI) medico-
\nlegal division.<\/p>\n
NBI pathologists exhumed the four year-old corpse at a public
\ncemetery south of Manila on Tuesday in an attempt to establish
\nwhether a woman like Contemplacion could have killed her.<\/p>\n
The two countries have downgraded diplomatic ties following a
\nstrong public backlash in the Philippines on the hanging. Ramos
\nhad banned new deployments of Filipina domestics to Singapore.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/work-promised-to-returned-maids-1447893297",
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
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