The Bureau of Immigration (BI) is warning the public against seven common schemes employed by trafficking syndicates and illegal recruiters in the country to enable their prospective victims to work abroad during the pandemic.

Since September 2020, despite worldwide travel restrictions due to COVID-19, BI spokesperson Dana Sandoval said the bureau has foiled over 130 attempts of human trafficking in some of the country’s major international airports.

The BI has thus warned the public against common modus operandi, including counterfeit documents, as well as departure attempts for countries with imposed deployment bans.

The BI’s Travel Control and Enforcement Unit (TCEU), headed by Ma. Timotea Barizo, is primarily in charge of intercepting illegal recruitment and trafficking victims. It submitted an extensive report on common schemes employed by traffickers and illegal recruiters.

According to the BI, these modern-day trafficking attempts are not the kind we regularly see on television, where syndicates are shown forcefully trafficking people across borders.

The BI said traffickers now use modern methods – technology, falsification and deceit. They sweet talk their victims and entice them to agree to such schemes, hence the need to send out a warning for people not to fall prey to these illegals.

A common modus is the falsification of overseas employment certificate (OEC), or tampering with Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) documents.

Legitimate Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) are required to present an OEC, records of which are linked in BI’s shared database with the POEA.

However, in instances when records are not found in the BI’s system, passengers are referred to the POEA’s Labor Assistance Center at the airport for manual verification. Here, we see instances where fake labor employees would make annotations on the certifications supposedly given by the POEA.

Barizo also reported visa discrepancies in some documents of OFWs bound for Saudi Arabia.

In some of the BI’s interceptions, it was noted that the actual job position of these OFWs is different from the one declared in their OECs.

More often than not, they are given permits to work for a higher position, but end up working in households and are paid salaries lower than industry standards.

In some interceptions, the actual job positions of these OFWs are far different from the ones declared in their OECs.

Sandoval said another scheme victimizes former OFWs by using their old OEC, but are given a separate tourist visa to work for a different employer and are sometimes even sent to a third country.

Last April 5, the BI reported the interception of a male victim under such scheme at the Clark International Airport.

The BI is also on the lookout for Iraq-bound tourists, wherein former OFWs in Iraq pose as tourists bound for the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Upon inspection, BI officers are able to determine that their true destination is in Iraq, where a total deployment ban for all OFWs is still in place.

Aside from this, fake marriages to justify departure is pretty common, said the BI.

Recently, a female passenger attempted to depart for the UAE to work as a babysitter on a visit visa, by pretending to visit her alleged husband.

However, upon inspection, said husband has already sponsored a different wife. The victim later admitted that she does not know her supposed husband.

Pseudo-training and assessment programs, often used to pretend that Filipinos would only attend month-long trainings, have also been noted to be a common scheme for traffickers, Sandoval said.

The TCEU under Barizo’s stewardship has also intercepted seafarers with invalid OECs and inappropriate visas. More than 70 seafarers were not permitted to depart since September for presenting OECs but with only business or tourist visas.

The use of business or tourist visas for work is not permitted as only those holding valid and existing employment visas could be considered legitimate OFWs. So, there!!

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Jokjok (from Elenita Francisco of Oriental Mindoro)—- Nurse 1: Hoy! Anu ka ba, bakit may thermometer sa tenga mo?!/ Nurse 2: Ha? Ngek! Susmaryosep! Kaninong puwet ko kaya naiwan yung ballpen ko?!?

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