A BILL seeking to modernize the Bureau of Immigration (BI) by putting up a P1.2-billion Immigration Trust Fund (ITF) will be set for plenary sponsorship and debate at the House of Representatives.
The consolidated bill seeks to modernize the BI “by expanding its organizational structure, sharpening the competencies of its personnel through career advancement programs, cutting red tape by improving data gathering and analysis, and boosting employee morale through a better, more competitive salary structure.”
The measure, which was just recently approved by the House justice committee, not only seeks to modernize the agency but also to touch up its pay scale and further professionalize its officers and the rank and file.
Principal author Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte (Camarines Sur) said the bill seeks to empower the bureau to collect immigration fees, fines and penalties, and to retain a third of all such collections, but not to exceed P1.2 billion, for an ITF to be administered by the proposed three-member Board of Commissioners for the modernization of the agency’s facilities and equipment, payment of employee benefits and further professionalization of its officers and employees.
The proposed board will be composed of a commissioner with the rank of undersecretary and two deputy commissioners rank of assistant secretary, all to be appointed by the President.
The measure was approved by the justice panel on the strength of Section 48, House Rule 10 which allows the swift passage of measures that have been approved on third and final reading by the chamber in the immediately preceding Congress.
Villafuerte authored with three other CamSur solons House Bill (HB) No. 274, one of six bills that the House committee on justice had consolidated into one measure for the panel’s approval.
HB 274 co-authors are Miguel Luis Villafuerte and Tsuyoshi Anthony Horibata and Nicolas Enciso VIII (PL, Bicol Saro).
Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, former Cavite congressman, recently stressed the need for modernizing the BI’s system, partly to effectively track foreigner, especially the illegal ones.
HB 274 states that “Commonwealth Act 613 or the Philippine Immigration Act of 1940 is one of our antiquated laws that need to be amended in order to respond to the changing times and be true to the Constitutional mandate of serving and protecting the people.”
“With modernization and increased mobility of people across the globe, crimes are likewise becoming more and more cross-border. Recent years show that many aliens in the Philippines have been involved in such international crimes as drug and human trafficking, prostitution, terrorism, illegal recruitment and even financial crimes. Accordingly, Commonwealth Act 613 should be amended to meet the new challenges of immigration and migration,” the bill said.
