Pimentel gives Arroyo wish list in meeting with Obama

CHICAGO – Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Q. Pimentel Jr. asked President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo Monday to seek the influence of President Barack Obama in pressing American companies to pay up the insurance coverage of the 11 Filipino civilian workers, who died or were injured in the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. At the same time, Pimentel asked Mrs. Arroyo to get from Obama "a reasonable yearly quota of the estimated 1 million nurses that the US would reportedly need by 2021." Pimentel said that if Mrs. Arroyo can get "a quota of 20,000 nurses a year, that would be a great economic bonanza for our nurses and their families." Pimentel, who was in Los Angeles last week to encourage overseas Filipinos to register and vote in the 2010 elections, said he has transmitted to Malacaňang his unsolicited advice in hopes that the President would listen. In a brief phone-patch interview arranged by Bobby M. Reyes, a Los Angeles activist, Pimentel said he has also suggested to Mrs. Arroyo that if the United States wants to "help solve the Moro secessionist problem in Muslim Mindanao," it should do so, by not "going to war there but by providing educational, economic and humanitarian assistance to the Moro peoples." Pimentel also urged Mrs. Arroyo to fill vacant positions for judges in 18 municipalities in Sulu. He said four regional trial courts in these areas are holding court in Zamboanga. Reyes suggested that Mrs. Arroyo include in "talking points" with Obama the revival of the inclusion of "certain aliens born in the Philippines or Japan, who were fathered by United States citizens as beneficiaries of Public Law 97-359, the Amerasian Immigration Act." Pimentel said the 10 Filipino civilian workers, who have died or were injured in Afghanistan in a helicopter crash last July 19 are being short-changed by their US-based employer, AIM Group, Inc. These workers were identified as Celso Q. Caralde, Ely I. Carino, Ernesto C. De Vega, Manolito C. Hornilla, Leopoldo G. Jimenez, Jr., Mark Joseph C. Mariano, Marvin P. Najera, Rene D. Taboclaon, Ricardo E. Vallejos and Noli M. Vista. "I understand that they were all covered by insurance and that the US government has paid more than $1.5-billion in premiums for the war-zone insurance coverage for the said civilian employees. Individually, the employees were entitled to $300,000." Pimentel said. "To the best of my information, the wounded workers and/or the heirs of those killed have applied for the benefits but the insurance companies like the American Insurance Group (AIG) have either rejected the applications or have offered token sums," Pimentel added. "In an earlier incident that might be instructive, a Filipino worker, Rey Torres, was killed in Iraq. An American newspaperman, T. Christian Miller wrote in an article published in the Los Angeles Times on July 21, 2009 that the AIG had offered only $22,000 to the surviving heirs of Torres. Torres, a native of Pampanga province, was supposed to receive insurance benefits amounting to at least $300,000. His heirs are contesting the offer through a lawyer but that will cost them a fortune and of course litigation time. The AIG is also the insurance giant, which US taxpayers bailed out four times to the tune of $170-billion, that Mr. Obama criticized for promising millions in bonuses to executives in the same division that brought AIG to the brink of oblivion. - GMANews.TV