OVER 2,000 FILIPINOS BROUGHT HOME FROM THE MIDDLE EAST AS THE WAR GRINDS ON

A chartered plane touched down at Villamor Air Base in Pasay City on the night of March 18, carrying 317 Filipinos from Dubai — 153 of them overseas workers, 114 dependents, and 50 passengers who had been stranded when commercial flights stopped running.

It was the third government-chartered flight since the crisis escalated, and it pushed the total number of Filipinos brought home under the Bagong Pilipinas Repatriation Program past 2,000.

THREE FLIGHTS, FIFTEEN DAYS

The repatriation program launched on March 5, more than a week after the United States and Israel launched joint military operations against Iran on February 28, targeting Iran's nuclear facilities.

The first government-chartered flight departed from Fujairah, UAE on March 14, bringing home 442 Filipinos — 200 workers, a batch of dependents, and 182 tourists who had been stranded in the country when the conflict broke out.

The second chartered flight came the next day, March 15, out of Saudi Arabia. Philippine Airlines carried 341 Filipinos — 328 workers and 13 children — who had converged on Riyadh from Al-Khobar, Dammam, and as far as Kuwait and Bahrain, traveling overland to reach the staging airport.

The third flight, from Dubai on March 18, added 317 more. By March 20, the Department of Migrant Workers confirmed total repatriations had reached 2,099 since the program began. Beyond the three chartered flights — which together moved 1,101 people — another 998 Filipinos came home on commercial and other flights.

Nine Filipinos were separately evacuated from Iran itself on March 10 and 11, crossing by land into Turkey with coordination from the Philippine embassies in Tehran and Ankara. Twenty-four more were evacuated from Saudi Arabia on a Singapore military aircraft on March 13.

THE MONEY BEHIND EACH SEAT

Each OFW brought home under the program arrives to P150,000 in immediate financial support: P75,000 from the DMW's Aksyon Fund and P75,000 from OWWA's Emergency Repatriation Fund.

At the airport they receive food, transportation, medical care for emergencies, and psychosocial counseling from DSWD staff. From there, the government provides domestic transport to their home provinces, with DSWD regional offices tasked to link returnees to livelihood opportunities through local government units.

OWWA Administrator Patricia Yvonne Caunan told SunStar on March 18 that the funds are holding: "The DMW Aksyon Fund and OWWA Emergency Repatriation Fund are working to cover all these expenses," adding that the combined budget of the two agencies remains sufficient.

The available pool is not small. The OWWA Emergency Repatriation Fund carries P1.286 billion from the 2026 General Appropriations Act plus a P474 million continuing appropriation from the prior year, totaling P1.76 billion, with an estimated P1.5 billion still remaining as of early March. The DMW activated an additional P1 billion from its Action Fund on March 17.

At P150,000 per person, the current combined fund can support roughly 17,000 repatriations before running dry — far above the 2,099 already processed.

VOLUNTARY FOR NOW — BUT THE LINES ARE DRAWN

All repatriations to date have been voluntary. The Gulf states — UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain — are designated at Alert Level 2 under the DFA's crisis classification system, which imposes a deployment ban on first-time and newly hired workers but stops short of mandatory evacuation.

Mandatory repatriation would be triggered only if the DFA elevates those countries to Alert Level 4. As of March 20, that has not happened.

DMW Secretary Hans Leo Cacdac has been direct about the threshold: "A mass repatriation of Filipinos would commence once the DFA elevates the alert status for Middle Eastern nations to the highest level, which is Level 4." He told reporters the priority among those requesting repatriation is workers who are "repatriation-ready" — those without pending immigration issues — while those with clearance problems are being helped separately.

Still, the government is preparing for worse. Armed Forces of the Philippines C-130 aircraft are on standby. Meeting points, exit routes, and relocation sites have been designated for each affected country. The Senate scenario-planned it: if 1 percent of the 2.4 million Filipinos in the region — roughly 24,000 people — request repatriation, the funding gap reaches P2.2 billion and the total cost climbs to P3.67 billion.

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian put the worst-case figure at P13 billion, covering approximately 93,000 Filipinos.

THE 2.4 MILLION WHO STAYED

As of March 20, approximately 800 Filipinos have active repatriation requests still being processed. A fourth government-chartered flight is preparing to leave Riyadh on March 22 — the first to draw workers simultaneously from four countries: Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia.

But 2,099 repatriations against the size of the Filipino community in the Middle East is a thin number.

The DFA's records count 2.4 million Filipinos across the region, the Philippines' largest overseas community bloc. The UAE alone holds an estimated 973,000 Filipinos. Saudi Arabia has 813,000. Qatar is home to 250,000. Kuwait to 211,000.

Most of them have not requested repatriation. They are watching the situation and staying, for now, in countries where missile and drone attacks have become a feature of the news cycle but have not yet reached Level 4.

The Philippine government has its plans ready. For the 2.4 million still there, the question is how far this goes before the plans get used.