MANILA (Mindanao Examiner / Apr. 12, 2013) – A Filipina household service workers temporarily staying at a shelter operated by the Philippine Embassy in Bahrain was found dead on Wednesday, the Filipino migrants right group Migrante-Middle East said.
John Leonard Monterona, the group’s regional coordinator, identified the Filipina as Kathleen Ann Viray Ilagan, 31, a native of Davao.
Monterona said he received an e-mail from a former staff of the nongovernmental organization Center for Overseas Workers, who sought assistance on behalf of the family of Ilagan to look into her death.
Ilagan left the country in July last year to work as pastry chef for a local company based in Bahrain.
She was deployed by the Manila-based agency named HRD Employment Consultant and Multi Services Inc. as shown on her deployment documents, according to her family.
Earlier this month, according to her kin, she left her job and proceeded to the Philippine Embassy as she sought repatriation. She was admitted to stay at the embassy’s shelter while attending on her case and repatriation.
Per report his family received, Ilagan apparently committed suicide, which the family could not believe saying that she “had no serious problems that will lead her to end even her own life.”
“All that she wanted is to go home,” one of Ilgan’s kin said.
Monterona said the Department of Justice should consider sending investigators from the National Bureau of Investigation to conduct an independent probe given that the death of Ilagan happened inside the Philippine shelter.
“We are calling the Department of Justice and Department of Foreign Affairs to probe the alleged suicide of OFW Ilagan. This should not easily be declared as suicide without conducting thorough investigation,” Monterona said.
Monterona said Ilagan’s death is mysterious. “What is puzzling us is that it happened inside the Philippine Embassy-run shelter,” he said. “The family of OFW Ilagan in Davao is seeking justice and we will join and actively campaign for it.”
He said the Aquino administration failed to ensure the protection of overseas Filipino workers, and not even in premises of Philippine diplomatic buildings and shelters. He said an average of 8 to 10 cases of mysterious deaths involving OFWs from the Middle East have been monitored by his group since 2008.
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