Ople Center asks POEA to blacklist Kuwaiti Instagram star

The Blas F. Ople Policy Center, a non-government organization that deals with OFW issues, asked the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration to bar Kuwaiti social-media influencer Sondos al-Qattan from ever obtaining a domestic worker from the Philippines.

Center head Susan Ople said in a Sunday statement that al-Qattan personified "the ugly face of modern-day slavery and should be included in the POEA’s blacklist of abusive and undesirable foreign employers."

“By her words, publicly uttered and shared through social media, her undesirability as a foreign employer, cannot be denied. She is not worthy to be even in the same room as our valiant and hardworking OFWs.”

Al-Qattan had posted a video in which she criticized a new law which allowed domestics to have days off and to keep their passports rather than surrender them to employers.

However, POEA Administrator Bernard Olalia made it clear that a “bilateral labor agreement that the Philippines recently signed with Kuwait and the guidelines issued by the POEA very clearly states that the passport should be in the possession of the domestic worker and that she is entitled to a weekly day off."

"Kuwaiti employers who refuse to follow these provisions shall be immediately blacklisted,” Olalia added.

According to the Blas Ople Center, Olalia had promised to immediately include al-Qattan in the POEA's blacklist

Meanwhile, the Ople Policy Center also called on other countries that send domestic workers to Kuwait to include al-Qattan in their list of undesirable employers. — DVM, GMA News