A month after the earthquake that struck Myanmar last March, the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) confirmed that no Filipinos requested repatriation from the country.

Instead, most overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in Myanmar requested the reconstruction of their damaged or lost documents, according to DMW Undersecretary for Foreign Employment and Welfare Felicitas Bay.

“That's the first thing that we did upon [the arrival of] our team was to repair their contracts. So we verified their contracts. The affected ones were damaged, or they couldn't reconstitute their contracts,” Bay said in a press conference.

A team from the agency and the Migrant Workers Office (MWO) in Bangkok also joined the inter-agency earthquake assistance program of the Philippine Embassy in Yangon from 28 April to 2 May.

Around 58 Filipinos in Yangon and 11 from the MWO Bangkok have been provided financial assistance. The undersecretary also said that they have facilitated the employment of returning workers who have lost their contracts in the Sky Villa building, with 32 employment contracts verified and five overseas employment certificates issued.

“The number is increasing because we have also announced… in the town hall meeting we have with OFWs in Myanmar that should they already be in the Philippines, they can also approach the DMW main office and the regional offices,” the undersecretary added.

There are approximately 800 Filipinos in Myanmar. Of this number, 700 are OFWs. Around 90 percent of them are employed in schools as teachers and under non-academic undertakings, including librarians, counselors, and administrative staff.

To date, Myanmar is under Alert Level 2, which restricts movement and limits deployment to only returning workers.