Outbound Filipino airline passengers may soon demand from the Bureau of Immigration (BI) to shoulder the costs of their travel expenses should they miss their flights due to prolonged questioning by its officers, Makati City Rep. Luis Campos, Jr. said Sunday, Feb. 4.
Campos cited a special provision in the 2024 national budget, which stated that the travel expenses incurred by passengers, who were denied boarding without a court order, shall be charged from the BI special trust fund of immigration fees and other collections.
“The special provision strikes a balance between the right of every Filipino to travel, and the BI’s obligation to enforce immigration laws,” said Campos, vice chairperson of the House committee on appropriations.
The measure aims to address the frustrations experienced by many Filipino international travelers in the past, who missed their flights on account of extended immigration secondary interviews. Some of them aired their grievances on social media, which went viral.
“Right now, we are still awaiting the guidelines to be issued by the BI, the Department of Budget and Management, and the Commission on Audit with respect to the implementation of the special provision,” Campos said.
Sen. Francis Escudero pushed for the reimbursement of the travel expenses of Filipino passengers who were offloaded from their flights due to lengthy interrogation by immigration officers “in the guise of fighting human trafficking.”
Citing BI records, Escudero said a total of 32,404 Filipino passengers were not allowed to proceed with their flights in 2022 alone, and “only 472 of them were found to be victims of human trafficking or illegal recruitment.”
Campos noted that Filipinos reserve the right to travel under Article III, Section 6 of the 1987 Constitution “except in the interest of national security, public safety, or public health, as may be provided by law.”
In his budget message, President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. agreed to the “conditional implementation of the special provision,” as long as it would not affect the mandate of the BI to administer and enforce immigration laws, including the Expanded Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act.
At present, express lane fees and charges collected by the BI are deposited in a special trust fund account with a government bank to be used exclusively for the following purposes:
-64 percent to augment the salaries of the BI’s organic personnel working beyond regular office hours;
-25 percent for the salaries of the BI’s contractual personnel; and
-The remaining 11 percent is remitted to the national treasury as income of the general fund.