Friday, February 12, 2010

DOJ sacks 15 Immigration ‘human traffickers’

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WILLIAM D. DEPASUPIL Reporter

Fifteen Immigration employees assigned at the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) in Clark, Pampanga province, north of Manila, were discharged on Friday by the Department of Justice (DoJ) for alleged complicity in human-trafficking activities.

Justice Undersecretary Ricardo Blancaflor, the head of the Inter-Agency Council Against Human Trafficking, told a press conference that the 15 employees were ordered to report to their main office in Intramuros, Manila, pending results of an investigation ordered by Immigration Commissioner Marcelino Libanan.

The identities of the employees were withheld because of an “existing confidentiality clause involving human-trafficking cases.”

Blancaflor, also the Justice undersecretary for immigration concerns, said that the 15 were implicated by an Immigration employee, a woman, who was arrested earlier after she was tagged as the escort and facilitator of a number of Filipino women who were recruited to work in Malaysia as domestic helpers but later forced to work in a brothel.

The illegal “escort service” at the Clark airport, it was learned, had been in existence long before Libanan was appointed as Immigration chief in early 2007.

Susan Ople, a daughter of late former Sen. Blas Ople and current director of the Blas F. Ople Policy Center and Training Institute disclosed that the discovery of the escort service at the DMIA could just be the “tip of a humungous iceberg.”

“The confession of Rachel Ong jibes with the testimonies and anecdotes oAf trafficked victims under the care of the Blas F. Ople Center,” Ople said, referring to the escort-facilitator who had been arrested.

Human trafficking is “a multimillion racket that has been ongoing on for years,” she added. “Credit must be given to the trafficked victims who bravely filed charges against Ong.”

Ople called on the other victims to step forward so that the syndicated escort service involving airport and Immigration officials and staff can be completely unmasked and eradicated.

The Ople center is a nonprofit organization that handles labor and migration concerns and develops programs to empower overseas Filipino workers and their families.

Two victims of the human traffickers, “Mary” and “Vicky” were recruited from their home province of Batangas and were sent to Kuala Lumpur to work as servants.

According to the victims, they were “escorted” through the DMIA and upon reaching the Malaysian capital, they ended up working as domestic helpers to “Alfred Lim.”

Lim was said to have accomplices in the Philippines who were paid for every individual that they could send to Malaysia.

Once the recruits reach their destinations, some of them are brought to prostitution dens and the others are made to work long, unbearable hours as servants.

DOJ sacks 15 Immigration ‘human traffickers’


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