Press Release
July 28, 2009

GMA URGED TO INCLUDE THREE ISSUES IN HER TALK
WITH US PRESIDENT

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) today urged President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to include three issues in her meeting with United States President Barack Obama at the White House, Washington D.C. on July 30.

In a letter to the President, Pimentel identified the three issues as:

1. The insurance benefits for 10 Filipino civilian workers employed by the US construction firm, The AIM Group, who died or were injured in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan last July 19.

2. The possibility of the Philippines getting a reasonable yearly quota of 20,000 nurses out of the expected one million nurses that the US would reportedly need by 2021.

3. The hope that the US would help solve the Moro secessionist problem in Muslim Mindanao, not by going to war there but by providing educational, economic and humanitarian assistance to the Moro peoples.

Pimentel said he understands that the Filipino workers who died or sustained injuries in the helicopter accident were all covered by insurance and the US government has paid more than $1.5 billion in premium contributions for the war-zone insurance coverage for the civilian employees. Individually, the employees were entitled to $300,000 each.

The 10 Filipino casualties in the helicopter crash were identified as: Celso Q. Caralde, Ely I. Carino, Ernesto C. de Vega, Manolito C. Hornillla, Leopoldo G. Jimenez Jr., Mark Joseph C. Mariano, Marvin P. Najera, Rene D. Taboclaon, Ricardo E. Vallejos and Noli M. Vista.

Pimentel said to the best of his information, the wounded workers and/or the heirs of those killed have applied for the benefits. But he said the insurance companies like the American Insurance Group (AIG) have either rejected the applications or have offered token sums.

"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 19, 2009 that the AIG had offered only $22,000 to the surviving heirs of Torres," he informed the President in the letter.

"Mr. Torres, a native of Pampanga, was supposed to receive insurance benefits amounting to $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 the parent company of the Philippine-American Life Insurance Corp. (Philamlife). He said he was told that Philamlife is the only wholly-owned subsidiary of AIG that did not suffer problems from the recent financial meltdown that hit many major corporations in the US and Europe.

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