The fate of Filipino seafarers

Many see seafarers as hopes in saving families from poverty. They also help, to a large extent, keep the economy going with their remittances.

I have classmates and friends who are in this kind of profession. True enough they are the heroes of their families and relatives.

The prospect of getting on board, particularly on international ships, inspires many young men and women to enroll in Maritime courses.

That possibility may now have dimmed for many aspiring seafarers who wish to be deployed in European Union ships. Moreover, 50,000 seafarers who are working on EU-flagged vessels may also face job loss.

What’s the reason? The Philippines continues to fail comply (since 2006) with the International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW) Convention.

This was conveyed in a hearing by the House Committee on Overseas Workers Affairs two weeks ago.

So, what went wrong? There are 23 discrepancies cited by the European Maritime Safety Agency, and these include “lack of facilities, equipment, and simulators for training of seafarers as well as the absence of procedures for students who have completed their onboard training in the different maritime higher education institutions.” Read that again, and tell me if that is something new as far as our country is concerned!

The Maritime Industry Authority (Marina) assures that it has been working to address the discrepancies. It has also worked with the Commission on Higher Education in updating the curricula on Maritime courses. Too much is said, but too little is done!

Well, it can be said the Maritime industry does live in a vacuum. It is very much part of a society in which at every turn what is substandard is normalized, and we are now seeing the results.

Look at many of our Maritime schools! I am sure they are inspected from time to time by government agencies, such as Marina, which is in charge of seeing to it that international standards in terms of equipment, facilities, curricula, and programs with regards to Maritime education are met. But you know what inspection means in our country! That some Maritime schools continue to exist and are raking in millions from hapless students despite the “discrepancies”.

The story does not end there. Maritime students doing their apprenticeships in many ships have horrible stories. Some are turned into family drivers, household helpers, etcetera, which are all far from what they are supposed to do as apprentices. In fact, years ago, a complainant sought my help because he was made to work in a piggery in the entire duration of his “apprenticeship”.

But like most Filipinos, our future seafarers have the patience of a monk.

It is during apprenticeship when you are supposed to apply what you learned in theory and to actually learn more. Sadly, this has been deprived from many. This is simply an injustice. But government has turned a blind eye to this despite the economic contributions of our seafarers to the country.

Who else can be blamed for this? It’s a long story, but the ball is now in the hands of the current resident in Malacañang.

We must wake up to the reality that the world is fast changing and so are standards. We have to meet international standards! We have to shape up or ship out!