00:00After more than a year, the Philippines has finally brought home the 17 Philippine seafarers
00:07who were rescued by the Houthi rebels in the Red Sea in 2023.
00:11Aside from their love for life, they also received a lot of help from the government.
00:17Denise Osorio has the details.
00:23The 17 Philippine seafarers who arrived in the Philippines last night at 9 o'clock were emotional.
00:29What's different from them is that they were hugged by their relatives who joined them.
00:33They are the Filipinos who were rescued by the Houthi rebels in the Red Sea in November 2023.
00:38They were ridden by the ship MV Galaxy Leader hijacked by the rebels.
00:43Aside from their relatives, the government also welcomed them
00:47such as the Department of Migrant Workers, Department of Foreign Affairs,
00:51Department of Transportation, Department of Health and others.
00:55According to DMW Secretary Hans Leo Kakdak,
00:58the seafarers were asked to go home immediately.
01:17According to the Department of Health,
01:19the Filipino seafarers need to go through medical protocol and debriefing.
01:24They are not traumatized.
01:26They came from a traumatic situation.
01:30What we don't want to happen is that they develop post-traumatic stress disorder.
01:36DMW is ensuring the assistance and benefits that the seafarers will receive from their agency.
01:42Continuous payment of what we call allotments.
01:45The payment of the salaries double in this case.
01:49All throughout the 428 days.
01:53So that's number one.
01:54Number two, we provided the necessary financial assistance to the families along the way.
02:00We flew everybody in to Manila to meet them personally face-to-face.
02:05Education and scholarship, yes.
02:07That will be among the next round of assistance packages we will provide.
02:13ASEC Kiko de Guzman is here.
02:15It's our reintegration ASEC.
02:17So there are also reintegration livelihood packages in store for them.
02:21The seafarers will stay with their families for the next few days
02:26while they go through medical protocol.
02:29President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. was the first to thank Oman
02:34for negotiating with him to liberate the Filipinos.
02:39Denise Osorio for Pambansang TV in Bagong, Philippines.
