Filipinos warned against fake Dubai job offers

by Web Report/Philippines, Apr 8, 2019

Scamsters promise high-paying jobs in the emirate.

The Philippines’ Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) has warned Filipino jobseekers of dubious individuals and agencies who carry out their operations through social media networks such as Facebook, Viber and WhatsApp. These entities have been found to promise jobs in Dubai and elsewhere overseas and are almost always a front for human trafficking.

DFA made the comments in a statement issued over the weekend. According to the statement, the department found that there has been a recent spate of human trafficking cases particularly in the Philippine mission in Baghdad.

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The department cites cases where the Embassy in Baghdad came to the aid of Filipinos who were being trafficked in Iraq. Almost all of them narrate the same story. The Embassy said trafficking syndicates have been luring victims through social media by offering to advance the cost of their travel to Dubai where high-paying jobs are supposed to be waiting for them. The victims enter Dubai using tourist visas and are then made to work without pay, supposedly as part of their “training.”

Once their visas are about to expire, the victims are told to accept jobs in Iraq or pay the syndicates the $3,000. they purportedly spent for their deployment. They are then taken through the Kurdistan Region where they are smuggled into Baghdad or Basra.

The DFA said the victims often face maltreatment and abuse during the trip.

The DFA reminded Filipino jobseekers of a deployment ban that remains in effect over Iraq. Those who enter the country without visas risk being imprisoned. They have also urged them to go through government-accredited sites for work overseas.