THE BUREAU of Immigration (BI) has ordered Australian missionary Patricia Fox “to leave the Philippines within 30 days from receipt of this order,” the agency said in a statement Monday.
BI noted in its statement it had issued the order that day, adding that the bureau’s board of commissioners “forfeited” Ms. Fox’s missionary visa “due to her involvement in partisan political activities.”
BI Commissioner Jaime H. Morente heads the three-member board, which also includes Associate Commissioners J. Tobias Javier and Aimee Torrefranca-Neri.
Mr. Morente was quoted in the statement as saying that Ms. Fox “was found to have engaged in activities that are not allowed under the terms and conditions of her visa.”
BI detained Ms. Fox last Monday on President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s order, as Mr. Duterte himself subsequently acknowledged, citing her “violation of sovereignty” through her affiliation with activist groups.
A day earlier, a leader of the Party of European Socialists, Deputy Secretary-General Giacomo Filibeck, was barred in Cebu, on his way to attending an assembly by the party-list group Akbayan.
For his part, Presidential Spokesperson Harry L. Roque, Jr. said: “We stand by the Bureau of Immigration’s order to forfeit Sister Patricia Fox‘s privilege of holding a missionary visa and to leave the Philippines. Investigation has been conducted and was determined that the Australian missionary violated the terms and conditions of her visa. Consequently, the same must be forfeited.”
In her statement, Ms. Fox said she was “surprised as I had thought the process was that I would have 10 days to put in a counter affidavit to answer the charges.”
She also said, “I am still hoping for a chance to explain how I see my mission as a religious sister and maybe the decision can be reconsidered.”
Her lawyer Jobert I. Pahilga said the BI order “was issued without due process of law and in violation of Commissioner Morente’s order for Sister Pat to contest the charge within ten (10) days from receipt of the supplemental report of the Intelligence Division.”
“The State through the BI has no right to cancel her visa without giving her the opportunity to contest the report of the Intelligence Division and to be heard on her defense. Sister Pat thus intends to challenge the order by filing a Motion for Reconsideration with the BI. She will also be filing her Counter-Affidavit to refute the allegations that she has engaged in partisan political activities,” Mr. Pahilga also said.
In his statement, opposition Senator Francis N. Pangilinan said: “This deportation of a 71-year-old, ailing nun is most deplorable. The act is not a sign of strength, it is in fact a sign of weakness. Harassing human rights advocates and faith-based organizations and individuals may succeed in the short run but it will eventually fail. Gestapo-like tactics will only strengthen the people’s resolve to resist. Hitler’s 1,000 years of the Third Reich ended just after a few years.”
Mr. Pangilinan’s Liberal Party ally Senator Paolo Benigno A. Aquino IV said in part,” In the 16th Congress, I filed Senate Resolution No. 260 to ensure that the freedom of expression of foreign nationals is not curtailed.”
“I will file a resolution once again to investigate possible abuses in the deportation of foreign nationals,” Mr. Aquino also said. — with Arjay L. Balinbin, D.A.M. Enerio
