Pinoy rape victim in Saudi Arabia faces added woe: mounting medical bill

An overseas Filipino worker who claimed he was gang-raped by five men in Saudi Arabia last May now faces another problem: mounting medical bills.

The worker is seeking help to defray the costs of his medication, which he said now amount to SR250,000 (PhP2,963,079), Saudi news site Arab News reported Thursday.

“(I) am not under any medication. I’m being held here, it’s like hospital arrest, because I cannot pay the bill,” he told Arab News, adding he had been in the hospital for nearly six months.

He posted his plight on Facebook last September 22, claiming no one had come to help him. He asked fellow OFWs around the world, "especially our government or someone else out there, to save me.”

"Actually, I’m forced to come out in the open because I cannot wait for them anymore. My bills are mounting on a daily basis," the OFW, 31, told Arab News by phone.

He added the Philippine Embassy has not given him any information about his case. The Arab News report described the OFW as a computer science graduate from Mindanao.

The OFW said five young men attacked him while he was heading home along King Abdullah Road.

But he said his medical insurance company would not shoulder his bill, claiming that he had failed to notify it.

The OFW said he wants to go home soonest, claiming he has recovered from the shock of the assault and now worries about paying his medical bills.

Meanwhile, fellow OFW Maricel Erasga Tunacao, who is based in Al-Qaseem, has been trying to seek support for the OFW.

She also appealed to the embassy to help him. — Joel Locsin /LBG, GMA News