LAST Saturday, the soil parted to welcome the casket that bore the body of a man named Robert Larga. He was “Obet” to family, friends and associates. A young lawyer of 48, Larga served as one of the directors of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA). He was also an expert on forced labor trafficking, having single-handedly written a manual on the subject matter for the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT).He worked for the Department of Justice, and also served at the International Labor Organization. Wherever Obet placed himself, there is value-added because he was a man in constant search for answers and solutions. Greed was an alien word, and corruption was as attractive to him as the bubonic plague. I miss having him around. When he headed the licensing division of the POEA and was in charge of the anti-illegal recruitment campaign,Larga kept his smile, his baritone coolness, while strictly enforcing rules and regulations. I write this tribute for his family – for his wife and two daughters — that they may know how much Obet was appreciated as an honest, hard-working public servant. I remember how for the first time ever,Larga held a Skype conference to talk to a group of stranded OFWs in Saudi Arabia, while his staff took down notes. When we had an urgent case at the Blas F. Ople Policy Center, I would pull him in, include him in online chat groups, just so we could have a definite opinion on what the POEA can do to help the distressed overseas workers. He always said yes. Every single chance he got to talk about the dangers of human trafficking, he’d say, “Yes, of course.” The non-government organizations that are active in the labor migration front saw him as a friend and ally. He had no airs. You’d never hear him speak ill of anyone. I miss hearing him laugh. Because when he laughed, it was spontaneous, generous, and infectious. It was the laugh of a person that you instantly liked, just because. He never intended to hurt anyone. Yet, it was an open secret among his colleagues that he himself was hurting. In a reshuffle of officers, Director Larga was moved to a unit that handled government-to-government placement of workers. His director-rank had been maintained. Nevertheless, a few insiders at the POEA knew...