Woman faces large-scale illegal recruitment case

A CRIMINAL case for large-scale illegal recruitment was filed against a woman who allegedly victimized 10 jobseekers in an illegal recruitment racket.

Assistant Cebu City Prosecutor Maria Theresa Casiño did not recommend bail for Elizabeth Chua, who was detained since last Feb. 14. She was committed to the Cebu City Jail last Wednesday afternoon.

“She offered to settle with the complainants but it was not allowed,” said lawyer Bernard dela Cruz of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) 7. Dela Cruz handled Chua’s case.

A person accused of illegally recruiting more than three individuals is liable for illegal recruitment in large scale, which is a non-bailable offense.

Chua, who denied the charge in an earlier interview, allegedly offered an assortment of high-paying jobs in Dubai and Malaysia to 10 individuals, receiving P25,000 in placement fees for each recruit in the process.

“Subject promised to deploy me for employment within two months,” said one of the complainants, Daisy Mae Avila, who lamented that the respondent later “reneged on the
promise to secure my employment abroad.”

Avila then coordinated with the other victims of Chua—April Catalya, Renalyn Perez, Pinky Ycong, Flordeluna Deleches, Misucel Cabatuan, Ma. Mirasol Carreon, Jaqueline
Miano, Judith Generale and Edna dela Cruz—and complained before the NBI.

Each of the victims issued supporting affidavits when the NBI charged Chua before the Office of the Cebu City Prosecutor.

An entrapment operation was planned after the NBI got a certificate from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) showing that Chua is not among the country’s licensed recruiters.

She, however, used to be a secretary of an employment agency.

The entrapment was carried out on Valentine’s Day, with agents posing as jobseekers.

The NBI agents met with Chua in a local mall and handed over placement fees.

In an interview at the NBI office following her arrest, Chua admitted that she does not have a POEA license.

She said, however, that she did not need one because she wasn’t recruiting people but was just doing “consultancy work.”

“Our company can direct-hire,” she claimed, adding that she runs a Cebu City-based consultancy firm, the General 18 Co., which represents the interests of a Dubai-based company.

She said the deployment was delayed because the Dubai-based firm that she did not identify “suffered losses.”

The complainants said they all paid Chua as much as P25,000 each as placement fees and said she identified herself as an agent of Speed Continental Employment Agency to some, and the SHFIA International Manpower Services to others.

But executives of the two licensed recruitment agencies issued affidavits saying that Chua wasn’t connected with them.

“(Speed) did not hire the services to recruit for and in behalf of our company nor authorized Ms. Elizabeth Catubig Chua… as the marketing consultant or representative of said company,” an affidavit issued by the agency’s manager, Nanette Fernandez, read.

Analyn Buladaco, branch officer-in-charge of SHFIA, issued a similar affidavit.

During the interview, Chua denied claiming to be with Speed and SHFIA. She instead clarified that the two companies recruit for her on contractual basis.