A cry and prayer for mercy for OFW Dalquez

The National Council of Churches in the Philippines, through its Churches Witnessing with Migrants, joins the call to pray and support the bid to stay the execution of Jennifer Dalquez (“Gov’t urged to save Pinay on death row in UAE,” News, 2/26/17).

Dalquez, a 30-year-old mother of two from General Santos City is facing charges of murder in the United Arab Emirates. In 2011 she left her employer after a failed rape attempt by the latter. She sought another employer. In 2014 this employer along with two others attempted to rape her. Taught self-defense by her father, she thwarted the attack, in the process stabbing her employer to death with the knife used against her.

We take the side of the vulnerable. Dalquez’s move was an act of self-defense. May her death sentence be commuted. We hold on to the pronouncement of the administration to do more to protect overseas Filipino workers, especially women. Unless measures are taken to protect them, their vulnerability to abuse remains high, the great risk they took for enforced migration not-withstanding. We will not grow tired in calling attention to the need for national industrialization, among other ways, to keep our people home. We will not grow weary in being critical of the government’s “Labor Export Policy” until it is more protective of Filipino workers.

Prayer and work are one. With the advent of Lent, we bid everyone to reflect on the ways we have been insensitive to the welfare of others. May we grow ever vigilant that these things which deny abundant life may become things of the past.

No to more Filipinos being forced to work overseas! May migration be a happy option.

No to more Filipinos facing senseless death sentences overseas!

May God have mercy on us all.

JUSTICE RAOUL V. VICTORINO (ret.), SHARON ROSE JOY RUIZ-DUREMDES, BISHOP RODOLFO A. JUAN , LISSA BELLE R. BROWN, REYNALDO M. NATIVIDAD, REV. REX RB REYES JR., National Council of Churches in the Philippines, nccp_oga@yahoo.com