By JUN RAMIREZ
A ranking official of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) said that many of the employees who were implicated in the so-called “pastillas” scheme at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) have been relieved of their posts and are the subject of administrative investigation.
BI Deputy Commissioner J. Tobias Javier told the Senate Committee on Women, Family Relations, and Gender Equality last Tuesday that the bureau has already implemented a top to bottom revamp of its personnel at the NAIA last February when the alleged scam was exposed.
He said that aside from relieving the personnel involved and replacing the terminal heads and their deputies at the airport, BI Commissioner Jaime Morente also placed the BI’s travel control and enforcement unit and border control and intelligence unit under the supervision of the bureau’s intelligence division.
Javier added that the initial recommendations of a fact-finding committee which Morente formed to investigate the scheme have been submitted to the Department of Justice (DoJ).
As for the visa-upon-arrival program which the BI Implemented to facilitate the entry of Chinese tourists into the country, Javier disclosed that the scheme remains suspended since January due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Javier explained that the Philippines remains off-limits to foreign tourists, hence, it cannot resume the implementation of the VUA amid existing travel restrictions.
The BI official, nonetheless, disclosed that changes to the implementing guidelines of the VUA have been effected, such as prohibiting VUA recipients to extend their stay beyond the allowable period of 30 days.
He stressed that grantees of the VUA cannot convert their status to other visa categories and are banned from seeking employment in the country.
Javier assured that the records of the VUA are intact and that statistics on the number of Chinese tourists who entered the country via the scheme can easily be accessed from the bureau’s database.
