OFFICIALS and rank and file employees of the Bureau of Immigration has urged Congress to pass a new immigration law that will replace the “antiquated” immigration act under which the agency still operates.
“We appeal to our lawmakers in Congress to prioritize the passage of a new Philippine Immigration Act. This law is long overdue and now is the time to pass it,” Commissioner Jaime Morente said in a statement.
Morente said that the 1940 immigration act is no longer attuned to present realities as the said law was passed during the Commonwealth period when the country was still a colony of the United States.
“In those days we were not yet confronted with the problems of terrorism and human trafficking. And ideas such as globalization, borderless economies and free trade were not yet practiced,” Morente said.
“It’s about time that we enact a new immigration law that will cater to our national interest in these modern times,” he added.
According to the BI chief, a new immigration law should be crafted to address the ever growing threat of international trafficking and the scourge of human trafficking that has victimized many Filipinos.
He said the same law should plug loopholes in the BI’s systems and practices that are prone to corrupt practices.
Morente also stressed that the corruption can be curbed if the law upgrades the salary scales of BI employees which he described as very low compared to the take-home pay that their counterparts in other Asian countries get.
It was on Sept. 3, 1940 that then US President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law Commonwealth Act No. 613 or the Philippine Immigration Act, which created the BI under the supervision of the Office of the President.
Afterwards, it was attached to the Department of Justice and again to the Office of the President and later the Department of Labor.
It was in 1948 that the BI reverted to the supervision of the Justice department where it remains up to the present.