At Mabini Reintegration Caravan

OWWA hands P362K aid

to 15 OFW beneficiaries

MABINI, Bohol (PIA)—Hauling in services to communities, the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) and its Overseas Workers’ Welfare Administration (OWWA) led a service caravan of partner national government agencies to this town, hand over a total of P362,930 in checks representing the range of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW) programs for reintegration and making frontline services accessible to those in need.

At the OWWA SIETE Reintegration Caravan; a day-long one-stop-shop of programs and services where OFWS, returning OFWs, active OFWs and their dependents conveniently access programs, services, livelihood opportunities and assistance from various national government agencies and participating private sector partners.

OWWA 7 Officer in Charge and Regional Director Dineza Gelle, with the DMW and local officials handed the checks representing OWWA’s Workers Assistance Program (WAP) for ill members, Balik Pinas Balik Hanapbuhay Program (BPBH), OWWA Rebate program (ORP), OWWA Financial Assistance Program (FAP), Insurance Claims Fund (ICF) and Education and Livelihood Assistance Program (ELAP).

Nestoria Balahay, 63 years old mother from nearby El Progreso, Alicia said the money she received would form the start up capital for a small agri-vet supply in the barangay.

She will also get part of the money for the school requirements of her two grandchildren, who have lost their dad, who is still a missing seaman believed to fall overboard while in transit from Brazil to Singapore.

Rogelio Balahay Jr., was barely five months in service after getting promoted as an Ordinary Seaman (OS) to Able Bodied seaman, when he went missing.

“He did not know that he should not have accepted the promotion as he was able to step-over other ordinary seamen who have been aspiring for the promotion before he came on board,” she said.

His parents told him to accept the promotion, thinking that with a better pay, he could finally get married to formally give his two children the legal rights.

The Balahay family initially received financial assistance from the shipping agency and some P220 K from OWWA.

While getting the OWWA assistance, she was told to apply for the ELA, which the mother filed July 7, 2026.

Balahay came along with 15 OFWs and their dependents, as well as OFWs from neighboring towns to the OWWA Siete Reintegration Caravan held inside the Mabini Gymnasium, August 20.

“Daghan kayo nga salamat OWWA, nga inyo gyud nga gihatud ang tabang,” Balahay said.

The caravan also brought government frontline services that relate to the needs of OFWs from travel and work document facilitation, upskilling options to jobs facilitation, information assistance, networking with other allied agencies and financial assistance for livelihood capitalization and distribution of goodies.

Do not miss the services, while we are here, because it is not that all day, you can get these services in one place, Mayor Ongie Grace Lim said. (PIABohol)

OH WOW. OWWA program beneficiaries receive their checks representing financial assistance for illnesses, livelihood, rebates, insurance claims and education assistance program amounting to P362K, to help returning OFWs and their dependents amidst the crisis and repatriation. (PIABohol)

OWWA 7 OIC Deniza Gelle exchange pleasantries with Mayor Ongie Grace Lim and Vice Governor Nick Besas during the OWWA 7 reintegration caravan in Mabini, Bohol. The activity is OWWA’s first big event in Mabini. (PIABohol)

59 campus journalists, paper

advisers join PIA write-shop

CORTES, Bohol (PIA)—In yet another first for 2026, 59 campus journalists along with school publication advisers from four schools availed of the full range of journalism workshops from a government agency that keeps this as part of their mandate.

Twenty first-time writers from parochial school Infant King Academy (IKA) in Cortes, 17 campus journalists from Sacred Heart Academy (SHA), 15 student writers from Saint Vincent Ferrer Institute (SVI) and a lean but mean seven-man team from Salus Institute of Technology (SIT) survived the tightly- set two-day Student Campus Organ Organization and Production Seminars (SCOOPS) offered by the Philippine Information Agency (PIA).

Coordinated by IKA school organ Sto. Nino’s Cradle adviser Aubrey Mae de Leon, in an official request dated August 12, the training and writing workshops were not only an orientation on the basics of campus journalism, but also to equip writers with the basic skillset necessary for the upcoming division schools press conference.

While the PIA dispenses journalism workshops, it is usually done to suit specific and individual school writers’ teams, or volunteer community information officers and social media content creators.

The writeshops, to be sustainable has to be accompanies by similar re-orientation for school paper advisers whose responsibility is to hand-hold the young writers to the proper direction of their school publications and the upgrading of the writers’ skill sets.

Topics of the writeshop include the school paper organization, basic newswriting, basic photojournalism, sports journalism, copy reading and headline writing, feature writing and Op-ed, editorial writing and basic newspaper layout.

Written outputs of the writeshop were supposed to be laid-out over news paper dummies, but for lack of time, concluding presentations only illustrated the basic dummies.

The activity was held at the Sto. Nino Parish convent social hall, in Cortes. (PIABohol)

DUMMYING FOR DUMMIES. On the general observation that published school papers are generally laid-out by printing companies, the PIA workshops included Basic Layout so student writers can submit the dummy to the printers and own the total output as student planned publications. (PIAbohol)

STEP ONE. Participants of the journalism workshop take one more task; the hardest of which is to keep writing to whet their skills, a take-away after completing two days of grueling writing and instructions. (PIABohol)