The proposed Department of Overseas Filipinos (DOFIL) will consolidate the various government offices that cater to the needs of over 10 million overseas Filipinos (OFs)––including overseas Filipino workers (OFWs)––in order to serve them more efficiently and effectively without bloating the bureaucracy and without the need for additional funding.
This was emphasized on Monday by Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles, who in a virtual Senate hearing informed members of Senate committees on Labor, Foreign Relations, and Finance that the DOFIL is an “amalgamation of all key offices dealing with migrant/migrant workers protection into a single entity.”
“The new Department seeks to streamline and directly manage all concerns of Filipinos overseas plus their families and dependents in the Philippines to make our services to OFs more responsive, efficient, and effective.”
“It will avoid overlapping functions and consolidate the budgetary allocations to a single public entity for better and more efficient service to OFs and their families,” explained the former legislator from Mindanao.
“The new Department seeks to streamline and directly manage all concerns of Filipinos overseas plus their families and dependents in the Philippines to make our services to OFs more responsive, efficient, and effective.”
The Palace official pointed out that “currently, there are different agencies that have mandates relative to Overseas Filipinos, including those related to employment and migration.”
The offices include the Office of the Undersecretary for Migrant Workers’ Affairs (OUMWA) under the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), the Commission on Filipinos Overseas (CFO) under the Office of the President, the International Labor Affairs Bureau (ILAB) and National Reintegration Center for OFWs (NCRO) under the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), and the International Social Services Office (ISSO) under the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).
Nograles lamented that “the absence of a single agency to address these concerns is making it very challenging for the government to focus on the various needs and demands of Filipinos overseas.”
The numerous agencies and offices, said the lawyer, will be subsumed under the DOFIL for purposes of policy and program coordination, while the POEA and OWWA shall be DOFIL attached agencies that will continue to function in accordance with their respective charters.
As of 2019, there is an estimated 10.2 million OFs around the world, and they are credited for driving domestic consumption as well as accounting for 9.3% of the Gross Domestic Product and 7.8% of the Gross National Income in 2019.
The former Appropriations Chair clarified that the DOFIL “will not be another big-budget ticket on the National Expenditure Program (NEP), but rather a rightsizing solution.”
“The creation of the DOFIL will not require a large amount from the NEP as the budget previously assigned to absorbed offices will be the statutory budget for this new Department.”
The budget of the proposed DOFIL will include funds that have been allocated for:
- DFA OUMWA (16 million pesos), including the Assistance to Nationals Fund (one billion pesos) and the Legal Assistance Fund (200 million pesos) budget lodged with the DFA
- CFO (152 million pesos)
- DOLE: ILAB (31.528 million pesos) and Philippine Overseas Labor Office (1.375 billion pesos) and NRCO (PHP4.219 billion pesos)
- DSWD: Social Welfare Attachés Office (SWATO) now operating as ISSO (169 million pesos)
The respective budgets of the POEA (507 million pesos) and the OWWA (7.39 billion pesos) will be treated separately from the DOFIL as they shall be attached agencies with their own charters.
Last December, President Rodrigo Duterte certified as urgent Senate Bill No. 1949, or the creation of a department focused solely on the needs of overseas Filipinos and their families. As of 2019, there is an estimated 10.2 million OFs around the world, and they are credited for driving domestic consumption as well as accounting for 9.3% of the Gross Domestic Product and 7.8% of the Gross National Income in 2019.