Hold departure disorder

Either some have been paid off or there are a bunch of incompetent people manning our immigration counters and borders. That is the current suspicion and sentiment of Senators and the general public who’ve been listening to the Blue Ribbon Committee investigation of the “P100 million Immigration bribery case.”

Senators, particularly the committee Chairman Richard Gordon are appalled how a controversial figure who has been placed on a watch list commonly known as Hold Departure Order, goes through two Immigration officers who actually screened the individual, had reason to suspect that the person of interest was on the watch list, and yet let him go his merry way to a waiting commercial flight to Canada. Off the cuff, the verbal reaction would be: Stupid, corrupt, incompetent!

But unless you have gone through the gauntlet often enough as I have, let us not be too hasty in our judgment of the immigration officers. First of all, they are “mere’ civil servants, not Senators, Congressmen, cabinet officials or rich people with powerful lawyers. Their job is their careers, is their source of income and they have rules and legal niceties they MUST abide by.  Did the Immigration officers do their work, Yes. They screened the person of interest. Did they follow procedure, Yes. So why did the Person of Interest walk off to his plane? Because his legal document allowed him and the system for HDOs is so broken you can dance around it.

The Watch list or Hold Departure Order has historically been issued through the court. A judge based on a legitimate legal request sends the HDO to Immigration and airport officials with all the necessary details pertaining to the identification of the individual. Through the years, that power to issue a watch list has either been exercised by other legitimate authorities or has been done by self appointed individuals with Law Enforcement powers. But while more and more people have issued or used the power to issue HDO, very little or nothing has been done to correct the many problems and horrors involved in issuing and implementing Hold Departure Orders.

The biggest flaw of HDOs issued by authorities is the lack of pertinent information regarding the subject of the HDO. In many cases, the problem involves persons with the same First name and Surname. Often there is no middle initial, no A.K.As or aliases used by the subject, no age, date of birth, approximate height or distinguishing marks. There are thousands of Filipinos who have been “victimized” with delays, harassment, interrogation, simply because they have the same name as a person of interest or on Hold Departure Order.

For years, I was a victim of such a problem and all the BI and DOJ people could say was go directly to the Secretary of Justice so he or she can issue a clearance saying you are not the person on the HDO. Why should the innocent or the Taxpayer be the one to suffer for the inefficiency or incompetence of others? By God’s grace, I one day renewed my passport and filled in my name the same way it was on my birth certificate where it indicated III (the Third). The next time I travelled, I was already prepared to go through the ritual of explaining: It isn’t me, never been there, never had a case etc. etc. Lo and behold none of the usual HDO process took place.

Imagine if you would that you were the Immigration officers on duty. You’re familiar with the on-going investigations; you know there is a Hold Departure Order for a guy named Wally Sombero. But the person in front of you is using an OFFICIAL Philippine Passport that indicates Sombero’s official name not his nickname or one of his A.K.As. That’s why the BI officers had to go through consultation. They however are not authorized to make legal interpretations. All they rely on are a computer screen with deficient information and a piece of paper with lists of names on the HDO.

On top of it all you are suppose to process people quickly and efficiently. Everything is mechanical. Senators and officials claim that the BI officers should have called the Commissioner, the Secretary of Justice. Just try and we’ll all find out it takes at least an hour if you’re connected or a week if you’re nobody. Meanwhile the people at the airport starting from Check-in to boarding have approximately an hour and a half to process 200 to 300 people!

If you detain or “Hold” the wrong person, you get a complaint against you and you are suspended along with your salary not to mention getting a “mark or report on your employment record. If you’re unlucky, you get sued and I wonder who will defend a government employee in a criminal or civil suit just for doing his or her job. A BIR official I know went after a big businessman and the person ended up spending time and money after retirement fighting the case filed against her by the Big Businessman. With no guarantees of legal protection, who in his right mind would go out on a limb based on a hunch?

Only Leila de Lima was “crazy” enough to impose a Hold departure order against former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo at the Airport, even though PGMA had a legal document issued by the court that allowed her to leave the Philippines to seek medical treatment in the US. Some say De Lima should have been held in contempt of court, others claim the HDO on Arroyo had no legal basis, while the administration then, stood firm that the HDO was warranted and legal.

Yes, someone could be corrupt as the Senators presume, but that too is a hunch and because our laws and system are so deficient in terms of requirement and implementation, everybody has a reason and an excuse to follow or not follow the rules and law. The Senators should also rewrite rules and laws on the HDO, requirements and information, tracking and consultation as well as guarantee the legal protection of ALL government officials in the performance of their duty. The legal and procedural defects, robs more Filipinos than corrupt officials do!

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