370 Filipinos repatriated from UAE arrive in Manila

Gulf News

A total of 370 Filipinos who were repatriated by the Philippine missions in the UAE have arrived in Manila on Monday. Philippine consul-general Paul Raymund Cortes told Gulf News it was the first chartered flight sponsored by the Philippine government and all passengers were not required to pay for their air tickets.  Read the full story here: https://bit.ly/30RT3bd  See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos  Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km  #Filipinos #OFWs #coronavirus

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00:00This is our first UAE repatriation flight to the Philippines sponsored by the Philippine

00:12government.

00:13This is the first flight because this is the first time that the Philippine government

00:17is chartering a flight from the UAE to the Philippines.

00:20The tickets are free of charge to anybody who asks for repatriation.

00:25None of them paid for their tickets.

00:27The government is giving them the chance to go home paid for by the Philippine government.

00:35Finally we're going to be able to go home now.

00:38Thank you very much to our government for assisting us OFWs and hopefully all of the

00:45distressed Filipinos out here will also be able to come back home soon.

00:49About a third of them are stranded tourists in the UAE, meaning they're on tourist or

00:56visitor's visa and were not able to go home following the lockdown in late March.

01:02And some of them are also cancelled visa holders, those who were terminated by their employers

01:10because of the COVID crisis.

01:12I've been in Dubai since February 16 and now I'm outside of the airport waiting for my

01:17repatriation flight finally because my visa expired a month ago and it really feels good

01:24that I'm going to be able to finally go home again.

01:28Hopefully next year we can set up plans again and go back here in Dubai and tour some more

01:33because we weren't able to do that for the past four months he's been here.

01:40Hopefully we do get to mount more in the next couple of weeks and hopefully bring more of

01:46our fellow Filipinos back home as well.

01:48Actually I was just going to drop them but I'll come back as my husband is here.

01:54But you know financially it's so hard for us now to be together but hopefully things

02:00go well.

02:01We would like to wish our Kababayans the best of luck as they retry to come up with a life

02:07back home.

02:08I know some of them have been living in the UAE for quite some time but the crisis has

02:13forced everybody to rethink its strategies and we do hope our Kababayans are able to

02:20come up with the economic opportunities back home in the Philippines.

02:24At the same time, as consistent with the embassy's and the consulate's plea for our or call for

02:31our Kababayans who wish to go home, please do not hesitate to reach out to the consulate

02:35or to the embassy as we hope to come up with or mount another chartered flight for our

02:42Kababayans to return to the country.

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