Fr Roland Doriol SJ spent 15 years in Cebu, Philippines as a Chaplain in a maritime school and at the port, ministering to seafarers and their families. He sent us this report after three weeks in Algeria in May, during which he met Filipino migrant workers at their work sites and in their camps.
After the welcome at the airport, my Jesuit companion Georges brings me right away to the crowded suburbs of Constantine, showing me first the streets and ongoing building of housing, then the site of the future tramway, a part of the future motorway and also ordinary roads in need of repair. This was a familiar sight, similar to places, and streets I seen in the Philippines during my 15 years caring for thousands of future seafarers who sail the seven seas of the globe today.
A while afterwards, we are on our way to the top of a hill, under which a tunnel is being built, just to get to a camp base where we have a telephone and a contact. Here is Edwin, a Filipino in his forties, with a friendly smile on a face that shows he is more used to working outside and hands more used to handling something other than a ballpoint pen. Then Théo arrives from the Igorot mountains north of the Phils.
The camp watchman gives us authorisation to call them and to wait outside. We recognize each other from a previous e-mail, and begin to exchange some fresh news without mentioning the “pasalubong” from France, a large bar of chocolate, and the Filipino Balita bulletin I used to print for seafarers. A few words of welcome in Cebuano and Tagalog, and that we look forward to meeting more Pinoy in the camp the following Sunday evening, if possible.
This is the way of meeting and getting in touch with these workers at the door of the camp, amidst the va-et-vient of minibuses loaded with workers from other Asian countries. I used to meet Filipino migrants on ships, after mingling with them in their country but here they are in Algeria, scattered in different work sites, building huge infrastructures – motorways, tramways network, and bridges and modernizing a gas plant in Skikda.
They are “parked” at night in base-camps and outside during the day, under escort when they travel and have very limited freedom to go for outings downtown. They work onsite for six months with 15 days at home, or 1 year with three weeks of vacation. In the camps they have Internet and webcam facilities and relaxed evenings among themselves, often far from the busy downtowns or shops. There are no supermarkets around, not even downtown and, of course, no way to find a bar with alcohol or even a beer.
The booming of these international work sites began in the 2000s. Thousands of workers came from China, the Philippines, Turkey, Vietnam and India to build the main heavy infrastructure of Algeria. One can see them arriving at the camps in minibuses and coming from the work sites in teams. We were “visitors” that day, and were allowed to give them a call to join us at the door – a first step towards meeting them.
This is how I came to meet them during those three weeks in Constantine, Skikda and Annaba – thanks to the friendship of local priests, foreigners too, who meet them at liturgical celebrations during Christmas or Easter, and thanks to a local priest who patiently requests for permission to meet and celebrate mass inside the camps on Friday or Saturday evenings. They are Christian communities “on the move”.
The future of these communities depends on the patience of someone who opens the door or at least keeps it open, and who wishes to share this opportunity with workmates. People, such as Paul from Korea, who discreetly invite them for the celebrations. Keeping in touch with and leaning on these “doorkeepers” is the way to work for the welfare of these migrant workers, using the mouth-to-ear Arab system. The migrant workers will go back then to their work sites having received some good seed ready to grow where they are.