Statements from various groups were read after the prayer service. A poem, Misteryo ng Hapis (Mystery of Sorrow), written for Fely by Palanca awardee and University of the Philippines professor Maria Josephine Barrios, was read in both English and Filipino.
The community wake for Fely, considered one of the largest public community wakes for a Filipina in New York City, was organized by the Philippine Forum, a community service organization in Queens and its domestic workers organizing project KABALIKAT.
Fr. Sancho Garrote, chaplain of the Jacobi Medical Center where Garcia ‘s body was released, said that grassroots community organizations are needed in pursuing justice for Garcia and all OFWs “especially in the absence of genuine rights and welfare policies for our compatriots abroad.”
Justice for Fely
Through the Justice for Fely campaign launched by various Filipino groups, the Philippine Forum said they have secured pro-bono legal representation for the family and are still raising funds to help the family with their financial burdens. It has also launched an online petition demanding justice for her death.
The “Truth & Justice for Domestic Worker Fely Garcia” has united the Filipino community across cities and countries. Filipino and Philippine solidarity organizations – such as Ugnayan ng mga Anak ng Bayan, Network in Solidarity with the People of the Philippines (NISPOP), Gabriela Network, Justice for Filipino American Veterans (JFAV), Ecumenical Fellowship for Justice and Peace, Alliance for Just and Lasting Peace in the Philippines (AJLPP), Committee on Philippine Issues, Ugnayan ng Kabataang Pilipino sa Canada / Filipino-Canadian Youth Alliance (UKPC-FCYA), Grassroots Women, British Columbia Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines (BCCHRP), Liga ng Kabataang Pilipino, Bethune House Migrant Workers Refuge, BAYAN Philippines – have shown fervent support for the campaign. Allied workers organizations – Domestic Workers United, Women Workers Project, New York Taxi Workers Alliance and Andolan Organizing South Asian Communities – and individuals from unions – SEUI/1199, American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), Transit Workers Union (TWU), the United Federation of Teachers (UFT), and UNITE-HERE – share in a common workers struggle. Immigrant organizations have also shown solidarity – such as Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), Centro Hispanio Cuzcatlan, CAAAV Organizing Asian Communities, and Immigrant Justice Solidarity Project. Academics from Barnard College, Cornell University, Pratt University, and University of California Santa Cruz along with students from 15 different colleges have signed and circulated the petition.
The Philippine Consulate has reportedly given the family a partial repatriation fee of $4900. No burial fee money, said the Philippine Forum, has been offered by the Philippine Consulate.
Meanwhile, Philippine Forum asserts that such financial, legal, and other forms of assistance should be standardized in a policy by the Philippine government, and not offered, as in Garcia’s case, on a case-to-case basis.
For migrant and Filipino community groups, Fely’s death shows the vulnerability of Filipino domestic workers overseas. They said that she was one of the 30,000 Filipino domestic workers in New York who, together with domestic workers in Hong Kong and the Middle East are forced to work in abusive, dangerous and dehumanizing conditions, without legal protection from both the Philippine and U.S. governments.
Even in the U.S., said the Philippine Forum, migrant domestic workers, who are 95 percent women, are overwhelmed with problems resulting from separation from their children, long hours of work, low wages, no overtime pay and lack of benefits. They experience systemic racism and devaluation of women’s labor in the domestic sphere.
The family, who was not alerted by the DFA of their mother’s death until 2 weeks after her body was found, expressed their dismay over the failure of the Philippine government to act until the community organizations pressured for justice.
“Sa nangyaring ito ay mas lumalabas lamang ang mga kakulangan at problema sa gobyerno hinggil sa pag aasikaso at serbisyo sa mga kababayan natin sa abroad. May pangangailangan talaga na baguhin ang sistema tungkol sa pagtulong sa mga Pilipino na maging policy at hindi yung case to case lamang. (Because of what happened, the inadequacies and problems of the government in providing assistance and services to our compatriots abroad were exposed. There is an urgent need to change the system of providing assistance which should be standardized in policies instead of handling problems on a case-to-case basis),” said Geraldine Gamboa, Fely’s only daughter.
“In spite of the billions of dollars of OFW remittances which prop up the Philippine economy, the Arroyo government still criminally neglects OFWs and treats them no better than dishrags when they become victims of injustices. Worse, Philippine officials here and abroad sometimes even serve as mouthpieces of host employers or foreign governments in their attempt to close such cases quickly,” said GWP OFW nominee Flora Belinan. Belinan said 7 out of 10 OFWs are women, and approximately 80 to 90 cases of abuses on OFWs victimize women domestic workers.
“Fely’s death emboldens us to continue the struggle for OFWs’ rights and welfare inside and outside Congress. We commit to forwarding our pro-OFW agenda in the House of Representatives to ensure that the Philippine government pays more than lip-service to the countless OFWs who toil overseas,” she added.
Both Migrante International and GWP have been pushing for a genuinely migrant-conscious legislative agenda in the Philippine Congress. The neglect of OFWs and the lack in policies continue despite over three decades of the Philippine Government’s Labor Export Policy (LEP) launched by former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos in 1974 to ease the unemployment situation in the country.
