THE Trump administration's latest move to impose one-year ban on Filipino workers seeking jobs in the United States (US) was a "cause for concern," MalacaƱang admitted on Tuesday, January 22.
Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said President Rodrigo Duterte's administration was worried that the decision would affect Filipinos who opt to work in the US.
"Anything that will affect our countrymen will always be a concern of the President," Panelo told Palace reporters in a press briefing.
The US Department of Homeland Security (USDHS) issued on January 18 a notice banning the entry of additional Filipino workers under two visas for a year because of "overstaying" and "human trafficking" concerns.
The USDHS particularly barred new Filipino workers from seeking jobs across the US under the federal H-2A and H-2B visa programs beginning January 19, 2019 until January 18, 2020.
H-2A visa program grants eligible foreign nationals to fill temporary agricultural jobs, while the H-2B visa program allows foreigners providing non-agricultural services to work in the US.
The USDHS said the overstay and human trafficking issues concerning the Philippines are "severe enough" to impose the one-year ban against new Filipino workers.
"The Philippines' continued inclusion creates potential for abuse, fraud, and other harm to the integrity of the H-2A or H-2B visa programs," it said.
Panelo said the Palace respects the US's decision, stressing that the Philippine government could not interfere in the Washington's policies, especially if there are sufficient grounds to ban Filipinos from finding new jobs in the foreign country.
"If that is the law in the US and if there were violations, then we have to respect. They have basis for that. We will only react if our workers are being mistreated, maltreated, [or] are being discriminated against. But if they violated the laws of the US, then they have to face the music," the Palace official said.
"The US government must have conducted investigation on that. If their investigation yields that there was a violation, I don't think pwede tayong makialam doon (we can interfere). What we can do is to do our own controls here para hindi nakakadating doon 'yung mga trafficking na nanggagaling sa atin (so victims of trafficking in our country won't be in the US)," he added.
Panelo, nevertheless, said the Palace was expecting that the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole) would act on the issue.
"I think that should be addressed to the DFA, as well as Dole. They are more responsible departments to respond to that," he said. "Let us wait and let us have the DFA, as well as the ambassador to the US take care of that initially because that's their turf."
For the meantime, Panelo encouraged Filipinos to just seek jobs in other countries aside from the US.
"There are many countries. Hindi lang naman Amerika ang pinupuntahan ng mga kababayan natin (We can go to other countries, apart from America)," he said.
"So until such time as they lift that, what we can do is first we need to know whether there is basis for the decision. If we can see na wala naman (that there's none), then we will ask for a reconsideration," Panelo added. (SunStar Philippines)