Binay pleads for more time as Saudis threaten to jail or deport illegals

Vice President Jejomar Binay RYAN LEAGOGO/INQUIRER.net

MANILA, Philippines — Thousands of Filipinos may face deportation or detention in Saudi Arabia as the Middle Eastern kingdom is bent at strictly implementing its immigration law after the lapse of its November 3 deadline for undocumented foreign nationals, including Filipino  workers, to correct their status or return to their home countries.

Saudi Ambassador to the Philippines Abdullah Al-Hassan issued the warning late Tuesday afternoon, just as Vice President Jejomar Binay, President Aquino’s adviser on overseas employment concerns, wrote the Saudi king to seek another extension to the four-month grace period granted in July.

Al-Hassan, in an interview with the Inquirer via e-mail, said Saudi’s ministries of labor and the interior have “made clear on several occasions” that they would pursue stringent implementation of Saudi immigration law upon the lapse of the November 3 deadline.

Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz initially gave undocumented foreign workers until July 3 to correct their status as the Saudi government enforced its Saudization policy, which gives hiring priority to its nationals. He then granted a four-month grace period until this Sunday, November 3.

“After the expiry of the grace period deadline, the penalty or punishments prescribed in the law shall be applied strictly on any violator among foreigners and their employers,” said Al-Hassan.

“There will be absolutely no negligence in the implementation of the rule of law against all violators and those who hide them. The penalty includes deportation and barring from reentry to the Kingdom aside from fines and detention or imprisonment to be imposed on violators among individuals, employers and institutions’ proprietors,” he said.

The envoy said undocumented foreign workers in Saudi Arabia had been given enough time to regularlize their status, with some 80 percent of those intent to do so having corrected their labor and residence status as of September.

“Hence, the granted grace period is deemed enough time for those who are serious in correcting their status or in returning to their countries,” said Al-Hassan.

He said the Saudi government doubled working hours at labor and immigration offices to process applications from different foreigners.

Citing the large number of undocumented Filipino workers  in Saudi Arabia, Binay wrote the Saudi king to seek another extension of the  deadline, already the second that the Saudi government granted undocumented foreign workers.

“As I acknowledge that thousands of Filipinos have already benefited from this humanitarian Royal Decree, I respectfully appeal for an extension of the 3 November 2013 deadline for foreign workers to correct their employment status in the kingdom,” Binay said in his letter to the king.

“Due to the large number of Filipino workers seeking correction of their employment status, many of them may not be able to meet the 3 November deadline,” he said.

Binay told the king that the Philippine government “is exerting its utmost to assist undocumented Filipino workers legalize their status.”

Since Saudi’s Saudization campaign,  4,302 undocumented Filipinos have been repatriated while 9,000 have had travel documents processed by Philippine missions in Riyadh and Jeddah, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Some 1,500 others who had signified their intent to return home are awaiting immigration clearances.

The DFA could not say how many undocumented Filipinos in Saudi Arabia might not be able to meet the November 3 deadline.

The Commission on Overseas Filipinos’ latest  estimate said there were 1.27 million Filipinos in Saudi Arabia as of the end of 2012, almost 108,000 of them described as “irregular” or undocumented.

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