Bring Tarongoy Home! Jobs, not War on Terror!

March 12. 2005

How soon it seems that government has forgotten about
Robert Tarongoy. To this day government is yet to
make a full public accounting of efforts it has taken
to ensure the safe return of Tarongoy to the country.

We have time and again said that Tarongoy's case only
highlights the sad plight of millions of Filipinos
abroad, an extreme case of the dangers that OFWs face
on a day-to-day basis in places distant and obscure to
their loved ones.

We would not be caught with a crisis like that of
Tarongoy if government would concern itself more with
creating jobs rather than positioning itself as a
staunch ally of US interests in its war on terrorism.

The government should immediately cut all military
relations with US, and start by stopping the
destructive Balikatan exercises being undertaken all
over the country as if the entire Philippines were a
US military base. The country has nothing to lose
from rejecting a tied aid of a few million dollars for
a sham AFP modernization program, since this won't
even translate into jobs and meals for ordinary
Filipinos anyway.

What we have instead reaped is destruction and further
conflict - the natural consequences of over-dependence
on military solutions rather than long-drawn but
sustainable political solutions to conflicts; the very
same tack the US is taking with regard to terrorism.

At the same time, we see Tarongoy's case as the result
of government neglect and irresponsibility, of its
bankrupt employment program, which fails to ensure
that Filipinos are gainfully employed in their own
country, thus forcing millions to leave and work
abroad in jobs that expose them to exploitation and
risk.

We demand that government seriously and decisively
address the jobs deficit in the country by realigning
policies towards invigorating the local economy
instead of subjecting it to the forces of
globalization and liberalization. We demand that
government protect and promote the right to work of
millions of potential Robert Tarongoys now, in order
to avoid seeing them hostaged and threatened with
execution in the future.

Tarongoy must be brought home alive at all costs, and
government must be reminded that it has stains on its
hands because it is precisely its policies that have
led to this mess in the first place.