OFW alliance presses boycott of Malaysian services,goods. An alliance of migrant groups on Saturday launched a boycott on Malaysian Airlines to dramatize their protests on the "inhuman treatment" of Filipino workers and residents in Sabah. Migrante International also urged Filipinos to stop patronizing other Malaysian services and to stop buying Malaysian products.
"The Malaysian government is guilty of gross human rights violations committed against the Filipino and other migrants. For this, they deserve our strongest economic and political condemnation," Made-in-Malaysia instant noodles, biscuits, chocolate sticks, disposable diapers and sanitary napkins are available in supermarkets in Metro Manila.
Migrante also called for the recall of Ambassador Jose Brillantes from Kuala Lumpur and the creation of a fact-finding mission into the mass deportation of Filipinos. "This tragedy has been brewing for the past several months. Clearly, Ambassador Brillantes has been negligent and inutile in protecting the rights of our compatriots in that country," Migrante said.
Migrante also slammed the Malaysian government for calling Filipino protesters as "ingrates." "The skyscrapers and cities of Malaysia were built off the backs of Filipino and other migrant workers. For dirt cheap wages, factories take advantage of the low wages undocumented workers are forced to accept. After they literally squeeze the life and blood out of our compatriots, they turn around and treat them like garbage," Migrante said.
INQ7.net, 31 August 2002
Sabah feels crunch of RP workers' expulsion. Several manufacturing companies in Sabah have begun feeling the crunch after Malaysian authorities deported thousands of Filipinos in their employ, a labor official said.
Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) chief Rosalinda Baldoz said owners of several factories have complained they might not meet their target quotas of production because of lack of manpower.
Thousand of Filipinos from different parts of Malaysia were sent home after being found illegally staying in the country. They began arriving two weeks ago in Navy boats under wretched conditions, sparking tension between the Philippines and Malaysia.
Most of the deportees, who have been living for many years in Malaysia, have found employment in manufacturing. But a recent crackdown on illegal aliens imposed by the Malaysian government forced them to go home.
INQ7.net, 31 August 2002
Tit for tat: RP readies raps versus Malaysian illegals. In an apparent case of tit for tat, Justice Secretary Hernando Perez has ordered the National Bureau of Investigation and Bureau of Immigration to slap charges on aliens, supposedly including Malaysians, staying illegally in the Philippines.
Perez said at a press conference that he issued the order after noting that some 1,500 "people from Malaysia" were entering the country every week through the Zamboanga port. He claimed that most, if not all, of them were carrying fake Philippine passports.
In another case of tit for tat, "running priest" Fr. Roberto Reyes and Msgr. Jerry Bitoon of Laguna served a "notice of expulsion" to Malaysian Ambassador Mohammad Noor Taufik.
Abner Afuang, a former mayor of Pagsanjan, Laguna, burned a Malaysian flag in front of the National Press Club office in Manila to protest Malaysia's treatment of Filipinos in Sabah. Afuang said that many of those deported were born in Sabah, and that Malaysia had no right expelling the Filipinos because the territory was technically part of the Philippines.
"Whether they admit it or not, the truth is that the Malaysians are afraid of the growing number of Filipinos in Sabah," he said. "They are afraid that Filipinos in Sabah will one day wake up, rise in revolt and assert our rights over it."
Afuang said he would burn another Malaysian flag in front of the Malaysian Embassy Friday. In the early 1990s, Afuang set fire to a Singaporean flag to protest the execution in the city-state of Filipino domestic helper Flor Contemplacion.
INQ7.net, 29 August 2002
Manila protests KL's treatment of Filipinos. Foreign Secretary Blas Ople on Monday summoned the Malaysian ambassador and handed him a diplomatic note to convey to Kuala Lumpur Manila's shock and concern over the "inhuman treatment" accorded Filipino deportees from Malaysia, a Department of Foreign Affairs official said.
Foreign Undersecretary Lauro Baja said during their meeting at the DFA, Ople pointed to Ambassador Taufik Mohamed Noor television footages showing the "appalling condition" of thousands of Filipinos deported from the eastern Malaysian state of Sabah.
Philippine television has broadcast pictures of holding centres teeming with illegals. At least one woman was seen weeping over her dead baby. Some of the deportees interviewed upon arrival in the Philippines also said Malaysian authorities fed them only one meal a day.
"The Secretary handed him a note of request for this inhuman treatment not to continue," Baja told a television interview. "The ambassador told us he was also shocked about the appalling condition of the deportees."
Ople reminded the envoy that Malaysian officials had assured him during his visit last week in Malaysia that Filipinos will be treated well. He noted the apparent "communication gap" between the officials in Kuala Lumpur and Sabah, Baja added.
Noor for his part said Ople "expressed concern over the condition of Filipino deportees, especially the sick children." "I promised to convey the Philippine government's concerns to Kuala Lumpur," Taufik told Agence France-Presse after the 30-minute meeting in Ople's office.
According to Philippine legislators, at least seven Filipino children have died in recent days under unhygienic conditions in holding areas crammed with hundreds of illegal immigrants awaiting deportation from the eastern Malaysian state of Sabah. Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Juliano Soliman early Tuesday confirmed the death of at least two infants during their trip from Sabah to the Philippines' Bongao town near the border with Malaysia. The babies died of pneumonia.
Malaysia introduced strict laws against illegals on August 1, with a mandatory six months in jail and up to six strokes of the cane for those convicted.
Since February, about 64,000 Filipinos have left Sabah and about 4,000 others are awaiting deportation, officials in Manila said.
INQ7.net, 27 August 2002
KL's crackdown on migrants provokes neighbors' anger. The Malaysian government was on the defensive Tuesday as its crackdown on illegal immigrants provoked anger in Indonesia, suffering in the Philippines and economic problems at home.
Officials scrambled to control the damage after Indonesian protestors burnt the Malaysian flag and Philippines officials confirmed at least two babies had died during their perilous sea-journey home. Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar accused some Indonesian politicians and the media of fuelling anti-Malaysian sentiment and warned citizens to avoid visiting the neighbouring country "until the situation cools down".
More than 300,000 people, mostly Indonesians and Filipinos, fled Malaysia ahead of the introduction on August 1 of harsh new punishments for illegal immigrants, including a mandatory six months in jail and up to six strokes of the cane. Almost every day since then courts have sentenced groups of those who remained behind to be whipped, outraging Indonesia's national assembly chairman Amien Rais, who called the punishment "inhumane" and "insulting".
On Monday, an Indonesian group protesting the whippings toppled the main gate of the Malaysian embassy in Jakarta and set fire to a Malaysian flag, calling for Jakarta to sever diplomatic relations with Kuala Lumpur. The Philippines, meanwhile, is grappling with the continuing influx of tens of thousands of its citizens heading home from Malaysia's Sabah state on Borneo island, where many of an estimated half-million Filippinos have lived for years.
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has asked Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad for help in regulating the massive repatriation, and the government has given the Philippines clearance to use naval ships to ferry home illegal workers.
Officials say more than 60,000 "boat people' have returned from Sabah, and on Monday another 1,525 Filipinos, many of them sickly women and children, arrived on a Philippine navy ship in Tawi-Tawi in the south of the country. "Some of them are sick and most of the children and women are suffering from respiratory tract infection," said Commodore Ernesto de Leon, naval forces chief in the south.
Celso Lobregat, an opposition congressman in Zamboanga, said the influx could have tremendous social implications such as unemployment, a housing shortage and health problems in the country's south, already troubled by kidnappings and decades of Muslim revolts.
INQ7.net, 27 August 2002
4,000 RP workers in Malaysia await repatriation. At least 4,000 Filipino workers in Malaysia are still waiting to be repatriated, according to Ambassador Jose Brillantes amid an ongoing crackdown by Kuala Lumpur against illegal aliens.
But Brillantes clarified over radio dzBB Monday that not all of these workers are for deportation. "Others have been issued travel documents. They voluntarily want to go home," he said. Brillantes said the Malaysian government has extended the deadline for illegal migrants to leave to Aug. 31 from July 31.
The Philippine ambassador to Malaysia appealed for more ships that would ferry Filipinos back to the Philippines. He said at least 80,000 Filipino workers have gone home.
INQ7.net, 19 August 2002
Extension of KL deadline on Filipino workers sought. Social Welfare Secretary Corazon "Dinky" Soliman said she would ask for an extension of the deadline set by Malaysia on the repatriation of Filipino workers who decided to leave amid a crackdown on illegal migrants.
Soliman said it would take at least two months to set up the processing centers in Tawi-Tawi where the Filipinos from Malaysia would be based temporarily while their papers are being put in order before officially entering the country. Malaysia has given the Philippine government until Aug. 31 to repatriate Filipino illegals.
Meanwhile, Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Lieutenant Arnold Balilo said they are ready to help the Navy in ferrying Filipino workers from Malaysia back to the Philippines. Balilo said Vice Admiral Ruben Lista has assigned two ships equipped with a small hospital and would have doctors and paramedics on standby for those who would be sick during the trip.
INQ7.net, 20 August 2002
President asks KL's help in repatriating Filipinos. President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has asked Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad for help in regulating the massive repatriation of illegal Filipino workers in Sabah, officials said Tuesday.
Macapagal made the request in a meeting with a Malaysian delegation led by Bernard Giluk Dompok, minister in Mahathir's department, officials said. Press Undersecretary Roberto Capco remarked that during the meeting, the President said her government was "hoping there would be humane treatment of Filipinos being deported from Sabah," even as she expressed her concern about the bulk deportation of Filipinos.
Large numbers of Filipinos who were living in Malaysia have been deported in recent weeks after Kuala Lumpur imposed tough laws where anyone found guilty of illegal entry or harboring illegal immigrants faced a mandatory six months in jail and up to six strokes of the cane.
The Malaysian government has denied allegations that Filipinos were being abused as they are being deported on ships that carry them across the two countries' martime border to the southern Philippines.
Labor Secretary Patricia Santo Tomas said after the meeting that "we're trying to ask that the deportees at least come home in batches of about 200 so it would be easier to document them and to take care of their requirements". She said that Filipinos were coming home in batches of as many as 1,000, making it hard to document them and check their identities. "What we're trying to do is make this a little more manageable so that women and children are not unduly prejudiced because of so many people being put together in one ship," Santo Tomas said.
Foreign Affairs Undersecretary Tony Rodriguez said that since February about 64,000 Filipinos had left Malaysia's Sabah state and that an estimated 4,000 Filipinos were still waiting to be deported. He said the Malaysian government had agreed to a Philippine request to extend the deadline for illegal Filipinos to voluntarily leave Sabah to August 24.
Santo Tomas said both countries had reached a consensus for possibly signing an agreement that would allow Filipinos to legally work in the construction, plantation and manufacturing sectors in Malaysia. "Hopefully, before the end of this month, such an agreement will be signed between us and the Malaysian authorities," she said without elaborating.
INQ7.net, 20 August 2002
Manila to start fetching Filipino illegals in Sabah. The Philippines has secured Kuala Lumpur's approval to send naval vessels to Malaysia's Sabah state in Borneo to repatriate some 600 Filipino illegals, the foreign department said Friday.
Manila would send one or two navy vessels following clearance obtained by the Philippine Embassy in Kuala Lumpur, foreign department spokesman Victoriano Lecaros told reporters. He did not give a timetable for the return of the 600 Filipinos, who have already completed paper work for repatriation and are "just waiting for available space."
In a separate interview with INQ7.net, Lecaros said the Philippines expects to beat the August 24 deadline given by Kuala Lumpur to repatriate "a few thousand" Filipinos illegally staying in Sabah. He said the government is tapping two Philippine Navy vessels to ferry the Filipinos in batches from Sabah's eastern town of Sandakan to the Philippines' southern town of Bongao in Tawi-Tawi province. Each vessel can accommodate 1,000 to 2,000 passengers and each trip from Sandakan to Bongao takes about seven hours, he added.
Malaysia recently offered an amnesty period of up to August 24 to allow illegals to leave without prosecution. Under tough Malaysian laws effective August 1, anyone found guilty of illegal entry or harboring illegal immigrants will face a mandatory six months in jail and possibly up to six strokes of the cane.
Officials say up to half a million Filipinos live in Sabah, some of them refugees of a Muslim separatist rebellion in the southern Philippines in the 1970s but most of them more recent economic migrants.
INQ7.net, 16 August 2002
NAVY RESCUES FILIPINO DEPORTEES FROM SABAH. Malaysia has begun its crackdown on illegal Filipino migrants, forcing whole families into overcrowded fishing vessels, Navy officials said yesterday.
Navy spokesman, Lt. Carlos Sabarra, confirmed television news footage of a Navy rescue of 173 Filipino migrants driven off Sandakan province in Sabah, Malaysia. The deportees were crammed into a 30-person vessel, Sabarra quoted the Navy crew as saying. Among those rescued were children below five years old and old women, the officer said.
Sabarra said crew of the BRP Sultan Kudarat, a PS 22 patrol boat, chanced last Aug. 1 upon a listing, overcrowded vessel around 17 nautical miles southeast of Tandu Taong Point, in Cagayan de Tawi-Tawi. Navy officers were getting ready to accost the vessel, he added, when they heard the sounds of women and children, and cries for help. Upon learning the boat's occupants were Filipinos, the Navy crew began taking passengers from the FB Jamilla.
Footage by ABS-CBN showed the deportees claiming they were prodded into the boat by "hot rods."
A Reuters report said "thousands" of illegal workers have been flocking to Malaysia's ports to leave the country or face new mandatory penalties of six months in jail and up to six strokes of the cane. The tougher laws took effect on Aug. 1.
There are 80,000 undocumented Filipinos in Malaysia.
Manila Times, 7 August 2002
MALAYSIA GRANTS PINOY ILLEGAL MIGRANTS ONE MONTH REPRIEVE. Malaysia has given illegal aliens another month to leave the country before they are subjected to arrest, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) announced yesterday.
DFA spokesman Victoriano Lecaros said Malaysian Ambassador to the Philippines Mohamad Taufik Noor relayed Kuala Lumpur's decision during a courtesy call by Southeast Asian envoys yesterday afternoon.
The reprieve will allow the Philippines time to bring home some 80,000 undocumented Filipinos in Malaysia, he said. However, Lecaros admitted the government would be hard-pressed to track down all affected individuals. Ople earlier appealed for a deferment of the Malaysian crackdown, saying the Philippine economy would have a hard time absorbing the big number of returnees.
Malaysia has warned illegal aliens they face arrest and punishment by caning should they not avail of the amnesty.
Manila Times, 2 August 2002