Palace defends Immigration order for Australian nun to leave Philippines

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang on Wednesday defended the decision of the Bureau of Immigration to cancel the missionary visa of an Australian nun and direct her to leave the country, saying that the order went through proper procedure.

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said that an investigation had been conducted and determined that Patricia Fox, a 71-year-old Australian nun who has been advocating land reform and peasant rights, violated the terms and conditions of her missionary visa.

Roque said that there was evidence that would show that Fox engaged in a political activity while in the country, referring to photos he showed in a past Palace briefing supposedly showing that nun speaking in a rally outside Coca-Cola in Davao City.

“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,” he said in a statement in reaction to the Immigration’s decision.

Roque said in a television interview that the Immigration revoked Fox’s visa because she engaged in activities beyond the introduction of her religion and the conversation of people to become members of their church.

Early on Wednesday, Immigration Commissioner Jaime Morente said that Fox lost the privilege of holding a missionary visa after the bureau’s board of commissioners found that she dabbled in political activities.

Aside from the cancelation of visa, her alien certificate of registration was also revoked.

The bureau, however, did not specify the political activities that Fox was alleged to have engaged in.

The Bureau of Immigration has given Fox 30 days from receipt of its order to leave the Philippines, which has been her home for almost three decades now.

Fox was detained at the Bureau of Immigration office from April 16 to 17 for allegations that she violated a bureau order barring foreign participation in partisan activities.

Just after Roque said that the detention might have been a mistake and that apologies might be in order, President Rodrigo Duterte announced on national television that he was the one who directed the investigation of Fox supposedly for disorderly conduct.

Despite the cancelation of her visa and certificate of alien registration, Fox vowed to continue her missionary work.

“I will continue my missionary work wherever I am as it is who I am,” Fox told Philstar.com.

“Hopefully the issues here of the indigenous peoples’ right to ancestral lands, farmers’ right to the land they till, urban poor’s right to decent housing and the workers’ right to a just wage and security of tenure will continue to be central to the mission of the Church to bring about the reign of God here and now,” she added.

However, the order does not mean that Fox cannot come back to the Philippines.

“Just like what the BI said this does not mean that she can’t return here anymore. She can return here as a tourist,” Roque said on GMA News TV.

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