Makabayan bloc seeks to probe cadaver switch in Kuwait

Makabayan bloc lawmakers on Monday sought a congressional probe into the repatriation from Kuwait of the wrong body, which should have been that of migrant worker Jenny Sanchez Alvarado, and the delayed return to the Philippines of her remains.

Gabriela Women’s Rep. Arlene Brosas, ACT Teachers Rep. France Castro, and Kabataan Rep. Raoul Manuel filed House Resolution No. 2213 seeking an inquiry by the House committee on overseas workers affairs on the error.

In their resolution, the lawmakers pointed out that Alvarado was among 1.2 million women migrant workers who were driven to work abroad by poverty and lack of decent job opportunities in the Philippines.

Alvarado, who had a husband with health issues and five kids, had been in Kuwait since 2016 until January 2, when she died from coal suffocation along with two other household workers from Sri Lanka and Nepal.

The next day, Alvarado’s employers informed members of her family about her death and told them that it would take time for her remains to be repatriated as the body needed to be autopsied first. On January 10, after several follow-ups by her family with the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW), a casket supposedly containing Alvarado’s remains arrived in the Philippines.

“The casket containing (Alvarado’s) remains was immediately transported to a funeral home in Cavite and opened for examination. Much to Jenny’s family’s horror, the body inside the casket was not of Jenny’s, but of someone they did not know at all,” the lawmakers lamented, adding, “Upon seeing the body in the casket, the five children repeatedly cried out, ‘That’s not our mother!’”

According to the lawmakers, representatives of the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration and the DMW were unable to explain the mix-up until Alvarado’s actual body was repatriated on January 16.

“Contrary to what (Alvarado’s) employer said, no autopsy was conducted on her body, and bruises were present on her back and behind her knees,” the lawmakers noted.

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The Makabayan legislators pointed out that Alvarado’s death “remains a shocking and confusing event for her family, and this has been exacerbated by the unexplained exchange of (Alvarado’s) remains to that of another person’s.”

They pointed out that the trauma of the OFW’s death was unquantifiable and that only justice could bring them closure.

They also noted that the subsequent “mistake” of the DMW and OWWA in transporting the wrong body to the Philippines and the lack of communication with the family to properly identify (Alvarado) before her remains were repatriated back.

“(This) raises questions on the handling of death cases of OFWs and how government agencies should coordinate with their families,” they said.