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CEBU CITY -- Young leaders in Cebu province signed a covenant Friday to help prevent and report human trafficking cases in their cities and towns.

"We will continue to be your strong ally in this fight," said United States Ambassador Harry Thomas Jr., who joined the youth at the Cebu International Convention Center.

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At least 1,000 boys and girls attended the covenant-signing by the Panlalawigang Pederasyon ng mga Sangguniang Kabataan (PPSK) and Movement of Anti-Trafficking Advocates (Mata).

"Children are not items to be sold, they are not for sale. Do not tarnish their image. Please uphold their dignity and innocence," said Aladdin Caminero, PPSK president and youth representative to the Cebu Provincial Board.

"It is very distressing to note that several raids conducted have led to the arrest and prosecution of relatives and neighbors of the victims themselves," Caminero said in his speech.

A similar observation was raised in the US State Department's Trafficking in Persons Report 2011.

Local ties

"Traffickers, in partnership with organized crime syndicates and complicit law enforcement officers, regularly operate through local recruiters sent to villages and urban neighborhoods to recruit family and friends, often masquerading as representatives of government-registered employment agencies," the report said.

It said the Philippine Government has made "significant efforts" to meet standards for the elimination of trafficking. But more effort is needed to protect Filipinos from "forced labor, debt bondage, and commercial sexual exploitation."

The report also identified Cebu, along with Angeles and Metro Manila, among the urban centers where people are trafficked. It described the Philippines as more of a source country (rather than a destination or transit country) for human trafficking.

Governor Gwendolyn Garcia said Friday's activity was a way of "sealing the commitment of the youth in raising awareness against human trafficking."

The US ambassador, for his part, described trafficking as modern-day slavery.

"Now we are all here to celebrate this event, but when I look at these young boys and girls, I cannot celebrate, I cannot be happy, because I know that there are young boys and girls your age, this very moment in this province and in my home country, who are being trafficked. That is nothing to celebrate," the ambassador said.

No aid

"We know who these traffickers are. We must give them no aid. We must prosecute them. We must send them to jail," he added.

Last June 8, youth leader Caminero signed a memorandum of agreement with the founder and executive director of the Visayan Forum Foundation, Cecilia Flores-Oebanda, to commit to adopt Mata throughout the SK network in Cebu.

In a press briefing, the Visayan Forum Foundation has said that the victims of human trafficking are usually 18-24 years old. An estimated 95 percent of them suffered physical or sexual violence as a result of trafficking.

Senior Superintendent Louie Oppus, the PNP Central Visayas office deputy director for administration, said in a recent report to the Regional Peace and Order Council that child exploitation and pornography are among the modern crimes being committed with computers.

Other crimes in this category include identity theft, fraud, narcotics trafficking, credit card fraud, theft of trade secrets, stalking and counterfeiting.

He said criminals are drawn to such crimes because of the "low risk and high yield." Anonymity makes the pursuit and arrest of culprits difficult.

Visit

Also on Friday, the US ambassador paid a courtesy call at the Capitol and met with the governor behind closed doors for about half an hour.

Governor Garcia later said she welcomed a plan to send a US carrier to Cebu soon, because this would help boost the economy in terms of tourism receipts.

It will also allow the Filipino crew to renew their ties with their families here.

The governor said she also sent a lechon as a "challenge" to the ambassador, who told her that Pampanga's lechon was so good, they brought some to Cebu for a get-together of the crew of a visiting US Navy vessel.

Deputy Speaker Pablo Garcia joined his daughter in welcoming the ambassador to the Capitol, as did Capitol consultant lawyer Christina Garcia-Frasco, the governor's daughter, and League of Municipalities president Nelson Garcia.

Governor Garcia said the ambassador was a "regular kind of guy, very easy to be with and with a very distinct sense of humor." (OCP/RSA/Sun.Star Cebu)

Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on September 17, 2011.

SULU, Philippines (Mindanao Examiner / Aug. 31, 2011) – Philippine authorities have arrested a deputy town mayor and his aide who were both linked to human trafficking charges in Mindanao.

Limtajar Bandahala Hassan, deputy mayor of Lugus town, was arrested in an entrapment operation carried out by undercover police and military agents at Paseo del Mar park in Zamboanga City over the weekend.

Hassan is being accused of transporting illegal Filipino workers to remote island of Taganak in the Filipino province of Tawi-Tawi before they are brought to Malaysia’s oil-rich state of Sabah.

Two agents, one from the local police force and the army, and a civilian informant who are members of a government anti-human trafficking task force, set up the trap and paid P18,000 in marked money to the politician in exchange for their boat trip to Taganak.

Police also seized a .45-caliber pistol from the politician, who identified himself as Limtazar Baladji, but government records showed his real name as Limtajar Bandahala Hassan.

Hassan has denied all the accusations against him and said he merely owns a passenger boat that plies from Zamboanga City to Taganak Island.

“I was fixing the boat’s generator when a friend approached and told me that there were people who wanted to go to Taganak. I just told him to purchase the tickets from us, so I went out with my purser to collect the payments. I am really innocent on all these charges,” he told television reporters from inside his jail in Zamboanga City. 

(Mindanao Examiner)

http://www.mindanaoexaminer.com/news.php?news_id=20110830235052

A Zamboanga resident was sentenced yesterday to life imprisonment   for being part of a syndicate that recruited a Bacoleña to work as a receptionist at a hotel in Malaysia, where she was instead sold to a pimp and forced into prostitution.

Bacolod Regional Trial Court Branch 48 Judge Gorgonio Ybañez found Richard Angeles Reyes guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the offense of Illegal Trafficking in Persons and sentenced him to suffer the penalty of life imprisonment, to pay a fine of P2 million, and to indemnify the complainant P100,000 as moral damages.

The judge also ordered his commitment to the Bureau of Corrections in Muntinlupa.

Salvador Acupan, head of the Visayan Forum Foundation Inc.-Bacolod City and member of the Regional Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking in Persons, said yesterday’s ruling was the first human trafficking conviction under Republic Act 9208 (Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003) in Bacolod City and Negros Occidental, and perhaps in Western Visayas.

The victim, identified only as “Jewel”, in compliance with the confidentiality rules, was a 28-year-old  college graduate ,  who was recruited    by Jocelle Gargar Magallanes  and Cristina de la Cruz Macapagal  in 2004  to be a receptionist and front desk officer at a hotel in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, promising  her  a monthly salary of P20,000 plus free board and lodging, Arnel Sigue, private prosecutor in the case,  said.

Reyes met her in Zamboanga, and when her travel papers were ready, brought her with seven other women to Malaysia on board the M/V Lady Mary Joy on Feb. 16, 2004.

However, when she arrived in Malaysia she was instead brought to the California Saloon Bar in Penampang, Kota Kinabalu and was later sold into prostitution, the court was told.

When she finally had the opportunity to escape by calling on a fellow Iglesia Ni Kristo member to rescue her,  and after all the fear and hardships she was exposed to during her three weeks in hiding to elude the pimp and his men, Jewel was able to return  to Zamboanga City  on March 27, 2004, the judge noted.

In Zamboanga, she reported what happened to her to Marine Maj. Ronald Añonuevo of the Philippine Center for Transnational Crime and was assisted by the Department of Social Welfare and Development and this led to her eventual return to Bacolod City.

Magallanes, Macapagal and Reyes and two other unidentified persons were charged for Qualified Trafficking in Persons in Criminal Case 06-28757 but only Reyes has been arrested.

In his 29-page decision, the judge said that, instead of the  good paying and decent job of hotel receptionist and front desk officer promised Jewel by Magallanes and Macapagal, she was instead “sold  by her recruiters to a pimp/maintainer of prostitution  who sold her to men customers and she was exploited as a prostitute.”

The odious and difficult plight of Jewel was never denied by Reyes, the judge said.

From his own testimony, he confirmed Jewel’s testimony that Magallanes and Macapagal recruited her for the job abroad and that he brought her to Malaysia, the judge noted.

The judge said the existence of a conspiracy between Reyes, Magallanes, Macapagal and the others not properly named in the trafficking of Jewel and other girls for prostitution purposes, has been well-established by the evidence presented.

When Magallanes and Macapagal persuaded Jewel to accept a job as a receptionist and desk officer in a hotel for a monthly salary of P20,000 and P30,000, they already committed the act of illegal recruitment.

The fact that the promised job turned out to be for a commercial sex worker makes it punishable by the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act, the judge added.

Reyes, 50, a driver from Zamboanga City, had pleaded not guilty on arraignment.

But the judge said that the acts of Reyes in receiving, harboring and transporting trafficked persons leads to the inescapable  conclusion  that he was  part of the illegal recruitment and trafficking syndicate group of Magallanes, Macapagal and a certain Roni Lee, alias Alhiong.

The judge said, considering the mental anguish, besmirched reputation, physical hardship and moral sufferings sustained by the victim  who was sold and forced in to prostitution, she is entitled to moral damages of P100,000.*

Report by Carla P. Gomez

Visayan Dialy Star

Source: http://www.visayandailystar.com/2011/July/27/businessnews1.htm

Domestic workers and advocates celebrate another first in Philippine history as President Benigno Aquino III called on Congress to prioritize the enactment of a law that will provide fair wages and benefits for domestic workers during his second State of the Nation Address, a press release from the Visayan Forum Foundation said.

“We are very happy that the president himself acknowledges the problem of the slave-like conditions of domestic workers, and is pushing  for a stronger law that will give fair treatment and just benefits to  us,”  Lilibeth Masamloc, president of  the Samahan at Ugnayan ng Manggagawang Pantahanan sa Pilipinas, said.

“This SONA is historic for us since domestic workers have long been ignored in policy discussions,” Masamloc added.

The Senate passed the Batas Kasambahay or the Magna Carta for Domestic Workers on  December 2010.  However, the Bill remains stalled at the House of Representatives despite tremendous clamor from domestic workers, trade unions, civil society groups, church leaders, and government agencies to pass it, the press release said.    

Vice President Jejomar Binay recently joined the long list of leaders calling on the House of Representatives to fast-track its passage, it added.

Visayan Forum president and international human rights awardee Cecilia Flores-Oebanda is optimistic that  Aquino’s SONA will spur representatives  to work harder to ensure the passage of the Batas Kasamabahay. 

The Batas Kasambahay increases the minimum wage of domestic workers from the 1993 level of P850 per month to P3,000, the press release said. 

It also mandates a written contract, social security and health insurance coverage, and improved protection against abuse and exploitation, it added.

Aquino’s SONA on Batas Kasambahay comes after the adoption of an International Convention on Decent Work for Domestic Workers, a binding international labor instrument that extends legal protection for all domestic workers worldwide, the press release also said. 

“The Philippines fought long and hard for an international convention protecting Filipino domestic workers all over the world.  The president’s message gave us another reason to dream that the Philippines will be the first country to ratify the Convention,”  Oebanda said.

There are 1.7 million domestic workers in the Philippines. 

An estimated nine million Filipino domestic workers are deployed worldwide.

Most of them are employed in Hong Kong and middle eastern countries, the press release said.