ATCI OVERSEAS CORPORATION, AMALIA G.

IKDAL and MINISTRY OF PUBLIC HEALTH-KUWAIT

Petitioners, vs. MA. JOSEFA ECHIN, Respondent.

GR No. 178551

Respondent was hired by petitioner ATCI in behalf of its principal co-petitioner, Ministry of Public Health
of Kuwait, for the position of medical technologist under a two-year contract with a monthly salary of
US$1,200.00.Within a year, Respondent was terminated for not passing the probationary period which
was under the Memorandum of Agreement. Ministry denied respondent‘s request and she returned to
the Philippines shouldering her own air fare. Respondent filed with the National Labor Relations
Commission (NLRC) a complaint against ATCI for illegal dismissal. Labor Arbiter rendered judgment in
favor of respondent and ordered ATCI to pay her $3,600.00, her salary for the three months unexpired
portion of the contract.

ATCI appealed Labor Arbiter‘s decision, however, NLRC affirmed the latter‘s decision and denied
petitioner ATCI‘s motion for reconsideration. Petitioner appealed to the Court Appeals contending that
their principal being a foreign government agency has immunity from suit, and as such, immunity
extended to them.

Appellate Court affirmed NLRC‘s decision. It noted that under the law, a private employment agency
shall assume all responsibilities for the implementation of the contract of employment of an overseas
worker; hence, it can be sued jointly and severally with the foreign principal for any violation of the
recruitment agreement or contract of employment.

Petitioner‘s motion for reconsideration was denied; hence, this present petition.

Issue:

Whether or not petitioners be held liable considering that the contract specifically stipulates that
respondent‘s employment shall be governed by the Civil Service Law and Regulations of the Kuwait
Government

Ruling:

Court denied the petition. According to RA 8042:

“The obligations covenanted in the recruitment agreement entered into by and between the local agent
and its foreign principal are not coterminous with the term of such agreement so that if either or both of
the parties decide to end the agreement, the responsibilities of such parties towards the contracted
employees under the agreement do not at all end, but the same extends up to and until the expiration
of the employment contracts of the employees recruited and employed pursuant to the said
recruitment agreement. In international law, the party who wants to have a foreign law applied to a
dispute or case has the burden of proving the foreign law. Where a foreign law is not pleaded or, even if
pleaded, is not proved, the presumption is that foreign law is the same as ours. Thus, we apply
Philippine labor laws in determining the issues presented before the court.”

Petitioner ATCI, as a private recruitment agency, cannot evade responsibility for the money claims of
OFWs which it deploys abroad by the mere expediency of claiming that its foreign principal is a
government agency clothed with immunity from suit, or that such foreign principals liability must
first be established before it, as agent, can be held jointly and solidarily liable.

The imposition of joint and solidary liability is in line with the policy of the state to protect and
alleviate the plight of the working class. Verily, to allow petitioners to simply invoke the immunity
from suit of its foreign principal or to wait for the judicial determination of the foreign principals
liability before petitioner can be held liable renders the law on joint and solidary liability inutile.
SANTOSA DATUMAN Petitioner vs. FIRST COSMOPOLITAN MANPOWER AND PROMOTION SERVICES,
INC., Respondent
G.R. No. 156029

FACTS:

Petitioner was deployed to Bahrain to work as a saleslady. However, her foreign employer took her
passport when she arrived there; and instead of working as a saleslady, she was forced to work as a
domestic helper with a salary equivalent only to One Hundred US Dollars (US$100.00). This was contrary
to the agreed salary of US$370.00 indicated in her Contract of Employment signed in the Philippines and
approved by the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA). On September 1, 1989, her
employer compelled her to sign another contract, transferring her to another employer as housemaid
with a salary of US$ 100.00 for the duration of two (2) years. She pleaded with her employer to give her
a release paper and to return her passport but she was unheeded. Left with no choice, she continued
working against her will. Worse, she even worked without compensation from September 1991 to April
1993 because of her employers continued failure and refusal to pay her salary despite demand. After a
month she was able to finally return to the Philippines through the help of the Bahrain Passport and
Immigration Department.

Petitioner filed a complaint before the POEA against respondent for underpayment and nonpayment of
salary, vacation leave pay and refund of her plane fare. While the case was pending, she filed the instant
case before the NLRC for underpayment of salary for a period of one year and six months, nonpayment
of vacation pay and reimbursement of return airfare.

Respondent countered that petitioner actually agreed to work in Bahrain as a housemaid for one (1)
year because it was the only position available then and that the petitioner herself was the one who
actually violated the terms of their contract when she allegedly transferred to another employer
without the respondents’ knowledge and approval. Lastly, respondent raised the defense of prescription
of cause of action since the claim was filed beyond the three (3)-year period from the time the right
accrued, reckoned from either 1990 or 1991.

The Labor Arbiter rendered a Decision finding respondent liable for violating the terms of the
Employment Contract and ordering it to pay petitioner: (a) the amount of US$4,050.00, or its equivalent
rate prevailing at the time of payment, representing her salary differentials for fifteen (15) months; and,
(b) the amount of BD 180.00 or its equivalent rate prevailing at the time of payment, representing the
refund of plane ticket. The NLRC Second Division, issued a Decision affirming with modification the
Decision of Labor Arbiter Mayor, Jr., by reducing the award of salary differentials from US$4,050.00 to
US$2,970.00.

Respondent elevated the matter to the CA through a petition for certiorari, at first the CA dismissed the
petition. However, the CA reinstated the petition upon the respondents’ motion for reconsideration.
The CA issued the assailed Decision granting the petition and reversing the NLRC and the Labor Arbiter
stating that the private respondent was only responsible for the principal contract entered by the
petitioner. Thus, this petition.
ISSUE: WON the First Cosmopolitan Manpower and Promotion Services are only jointly and solidary on
the first contract entered by the petitioner

HELD: No.
The Supreme Court ruled that under Section I, (par 3) of the POEA Rules and Regulations it states that
every applicant for license to operate a private employment agency or manning agency: “Shall assume
joint and solidary liability with the employer for all claims and liabilities which may arise in connection
with the implementation of the contract; including but not limited to payment of wages, death and
disability compensation and repatriation.” The Supreme Court has, time and again, ruled that private
employment agencies are held jointly and severally liable with the foreign-based employer for any
violation of the recruitment agreement or contract of employment. We cannot agree with the view of
the CA that the solidary liability of respondent extends only to the first contract (i.e. the original, POEA-
approved contract which had a term of until April 1990). The signing of the substitute contracts with the
foreign employer/principal before the expiration of the POEA-approved contract and any continuation
of the petitioners employment beyond the original one-year term, against the will of petitioner, are
continuing breaches of the original POEA-approved contract.

To accept the CAs reasoning will open the floodgates to even more abuse of our overseas workers at the
hands of their foreign employers and local recruiters, since the recruitment agency could easily escape
its mandated solidary liability for breaches of the POEA-approved contract by colluding with their
foreign principals in substituting the approved contract with another upon the workers arrival in the
country of employment. To be sure, Republic Act No. 8042 explicitly prohibits the substitution or
alteration to the prejudice of the worker of employment contracts already approved and verified by the
Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) from the time of actual signing thereof by the parties up
to and including the period of the expiration of the same without the approval of the DOLE. Respondent
cannot disclaim liability for the acts of the foreign employer which forced petitioner to remain employed
in violation of our laws and under the most oppressive conditions on the allegation that it purportedly
had no knowledge of, or participation in, the contract unwillingly signed by petitioner abroad. We
cannot give credence to this claim considering that respondent by its own allegations knew from the
outset that the contract submitted to the POEA for approval was not to be the real contract.
Respondent blithely admitted to submitting to the POEA a contract stating that the position to be filled
by petitioner is that of Saleslady although she was to be employed as a domestic helper since the latter
position was not approved for deployment by the POEA at that time. Respondents’ evident bad faith
and admitted circumvention of the laws and regulations on migrant workers belie its protestations of
innocence and put petitioner in a position where she could be exploited and taken advantage of
overseas, as what indeed happened to her in this case.

WHEREFORE, the petition is GRANTED. The assailed Decision of the Court of Appeals and Resolutions are
REVERSED AND SET ASIDE. The Decision of the National Labor Relations Commission is REINSTATED