Overstayer jailed for $211k theft

Sentencing was at Eastern court

By Vir B. Lumicao

A former maid has been jailed 9 months and 3 weeks after admitting in Eastern Court that she stole $211,000 worth of diamond jewelry and a tablet computer from her employer, then stayed illegally in Hong Kong for more than three years.

Fedelita R. Sante, 48, cried as Magistrate Peter Law sentenced her on Nov 5 to eight months in jail for theft and one month and three weeks for overstaying, to be served consecutively.

Law said he had discounted the sentences by one-third for the Filipina’s guilty pleas.

“Thank you,” Sante said in between sobs after the sentencing.

The prosecution said that Sante stole a diamond necklace with a diamond pendant, a diamond ring and an iPad Air tablet computer between Jan 6 and Feb 4, 2015 from her employer, Melanie Helene Silvie Viquel.

Investigators valued the necklace with pendant at $200,000, the ring at $5,000 and the tablet at $6,000.

At the time of the offense, Sante was employed as Viquel’s helper in her flat at Sum Way Mansion in Sai Ying Pun. The 37-year-old French employer hired Sante in November 2013.

Sante arrived in Hong Kong on Dec 11, 2013 with a domestic worker visa that was valid until Dec 11, 2014, but she failed to apply for an extension, the prosecutor said.

On Feb 4, 2015, the helper left without notice and became unreachable. When Viquel checked her belongings, she discovered her jewelry and tablet were gone.

After the theft was reported to police, investigators checked with pawnshops and one operator tipped them off that the defendant, who presented her Hong Kong ID card, hocked the necklace and iPad Air in January 2015.

The prosecution said Viquel paid the pawnshop $1,700 to recover the pawned items. Police returned the necklace to the victim and kept the tablet for examination. The only unrecovered item was the $5,000 diamond ring.

  

Sante went underground while she was hunted down by the police. She was arrested on Oct 5 for overstaying when she surrendered at 3:27pm to Immigration officers at Skyline Tower in Kowloon Bay.

Officers who ran a record check then discovered she was wanted for theft. 

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Health Wise free check-ups attract large crowd on launch day

Labor Attache Dela Torre watches as his staff and volunteers administer the free health checks

By Vir B. Lumicao

Close to 200 overseas Filipino workers availed of free health checks at the launch of Project Health Wise on Sunday, Nov. 4 at the Philippine Overseas Labor Office in Wanchai.

The warm response prompted Labor Attaché Jalilo dela Torre to open a Saturday edition of his brainchild project to cater for workers who take their holiday on that day.

Project Health Wise is conducted by POLO-Overseas Workers Welfare Administration Hong Kong in collaboration with Filipino Nurses Association, BSK and Integrated Midwives Association of the Philippines.

It is held at the community hall of POLO’s 18^th floor offices and is open to all OFWs.

Labatt Dela Torre told The SUN that POLO staff will work overtime on Saturdays to provide the health check. The official said he is looking for about five volunteers who can help staff attend to workers who want to avail of the health check on this day.

Those who want a check-up on a weekday may see either Assistant Labor Attaché Angelica Suñga or OWWA staff Joszoa Villa, both registered nurses, Dela Torre said.

The check-ups offered consist of vital signs, blood glucose, urine, uric acid, HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis checks. Volunteer nurses also provide breast self-examination tips.

As of 4pm, Suñga and her team had reportedly administered blood glucose checks to 155 workers. There were others who skipped this test and went for just the free blood pressure check-up.

A group of physical therapists led by Bona Cresencia provided free massage service.

The health service started at 8:30am and closed at 5pm.

“The aim is to enable our OFWs to recognize vital signs that could potentially lead to serious health issues in the future,” he said in a post on Facebook.

He encouraged more workers to avail of the free health service.

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Duterte govt blamed for deaths of Filipino tribes people

By Vir B. Lumicao

The Duterte administration has caused the violent deaths of 48 indigenous people and 169 political killings, a tribal leader has claimed.

Piya Macliing Malayao, secretary general of the Katribu Kalipunan ng Katutubong Mamamayan ng Pilipinas, also accused three government agencies of colluding to abet open pit mining, despite an ban imposed on former Department of Environment and Natural Resources secretary Gina Lopez.

Piya Macliing Malayao

Malayao said the DENR, along with the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples and the armed forces, are allowing giant mining firms to continue their open pit operations despite the ban.

She spoke live via Skype from the Philippines as guest speaker of the Tribal Filipino Sunday second anniversary celebration on Oct 21 in Annie Li Hall of the St John’s Cathedral on Garden Road, Central.

Malayao alleged that 16 aerial bombings that targeted Lumad areas in Mindanao and Cordillera communities had affected 7,000 people.

Worse, she said, the military planes were using phosphorous bombs, which have been banned internationally because they cause greater damage than conventional bombs.

Tribal Filipino Sunday with various Cordillera group leaders . 

The threat is made worse by President Rodrigo Duterte’s threat in July last year to blast Lumad
schools because they allegedly operate without government permits and teach the students to rebel against the government.

“Get out of there, I’m telling the Lumads now. I’ll have those bombed, including your structures,” Duterte was reported as saying in a press conference, as he vowed to retaliate against communist rebels who had been allegedly attacking bridges and government schools.

“I will use the armed forces, the Philippine air force. I’ll really have those bombed … because you are operating illegally and you are teaching the children to rebel against government,” he reportedly said.

Malayao said at least one classroom has been torched in more than 140 various forms of attacks on schools that have forced the closure of about 70 Lumad schools.

She said the schools had been put up by church groups in cooperation with indigenous and other organizations because there are no government schools in Lumad areas. As a result, more than 2,600 young Lumads have been deprived of education.

Evacuations caused by military operations in indigenous communities in two years have allegedly reached 53 incidences that have affected more than 27,000 people.

Malayao, a granddaughter of Cordillera woman activist Mother Petra Macliing who played a crucial role in resisting the Chico River Dam project during Martial Law, scored Duterte’s Build, Build, Build program, saying it would displace indigenous communities and ruin their cultural heritage.

She said the proposed 9,000-hectare New Clark City that will straddle Pampanga, Tarlac and Zambales will dislodge Aetas from their ancestral homeland.

The China-funded Chico River Pump Irrigation Project in Kalinga, Balog-balog Dam in Tarlac and New Centennial Resource-Kaliwa Dam at Panay River Basin Integrated Development Project in Panay will be set up in indigenous areas, Malayao said.

At present, giant mining companies continue to operate in more than 520,000 hectares of indigenous ancestral land while agro-industrial plantations owned by foreign companies are expanding in Mindanao and Palawan under deals signed with Duterte, she said.

These include 120,000 hectares earmarked for palm oil plantations in Mindanao and Palawan, in addition to 500,000 hectares already occupied by plantations on Lumad territory in Mindanao, Malayao said.

She said all indigenous communities should unite and oppose government development projects that will deprive them of their ancestral lands with the use the military in order to hand them over to foreign companies.

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Free Mario!

By Daisy Catherine L. Mandap

This issue we again print a contribution from Mario delos Reyes, one of our most prolific and best-informed contributors, who just happens to be in Stanley Prison, serving a life sentence for murder.

Mario has been in jail for nearly 25 years. He had hoped that given his exemplary record in prison he could be freed shortly after spending 20 years in the maximum-security prison, but this did not happen.

Under Hong Kong’s laws, life-termers like Mario could apply with the Long-Term Prison Sentence Review Board to give them a fixed sentence so they could eventually be set free. And normally, such applications are made when a long-term prisoner has passed the 20-year mark.

A case in point was local man Ho Tung-sing, who was arrested last May for his involvement in a brazen robbery in Tsim Sha Tsui. It was later revealed that 60-year-old Ho had been involved in a series of violent robberies three decades ago for which he got 17 life sentences. But following a review, his indeterminate sentence was fixed at a minimum of 20 years, and as a result, he was released in 2014.

Mario has been trying for the past five years to get the Review Board to also hear his plea for a fixed term, to no avail. In the last hearing of his application in July last year, the Board said it was convinced that the period he had served was “insufficient in all the circumstances to warrant consideration for early release.”

This was despite the many testimonials submitted by various people urging for Mario’s early release, including Catholic Chaplain Patrick Colgan and several other leaders from the church, civil society and other sectors, including this writer.

Fr. Colgan said the Board’s decision that Mario had not served enough jail time was “astonishing,” given his spotless record in detention and his positive behavior and demeanor.

“Until when will the period served be deemed to be ‘sufficient’? What internationally recognized criteria are used for this? It is quite bewildering to both inmate and those, like chaplains, to assist you and the CSD in his rehabilitation, to be offered such a statement, with no reasons given?” said Colgan in an impassioned letter he sent to the Board.

His frustration was understandable, for there could be no better model prisoner than Mario. Not only has he managed to stick to prison rules during his long confinement, he has also put his time inside to good use, reading all materials he could lay his hands on, and taking up all the free courses offered to inmates.

“Kung may law course lang na offered, siguro abugado na ako ngayon,” (If a law course was offered, I would have been a lawyer by now), he said wryly in one of the many letters he has sent us through the years, all done in his neat, cursive handwriting.

Mario’s compassionate nature is also shown by his effort to cheer up female prisoners, mostly those jailed for acting as drug couriers. Through his encouragement, a number of them have also submitted articles to us to speak about their ordeal, and to warn others about the dangers of getting involved in the drug trade.

But beyond Mario’s good nature and achievements inside jail, one is pricked more by the thought that he could have been unfairly sent away for a murder he did not commit.

High Court Judge J. Stuart Mooore, who presided over Mario’s trial in 1993, said in a letter dated Sept 1, 1995 that “a verdict of manslaughter might have been recorded by a more merciful jury against these defendants (Mario and another) on the basis of a joint enterprise falling short of the intention necessary for murder.”

Clearly, the trial judge himself was not convinced that Mario and his co-accused had committed murder; that the jury, had it been more merciful, should have given a verdict of manslaughter, for which a 7-year jail term would already be on the high side.

A veteran court interpreter who was at the trial had confided many years ago that she was not convinced of Mario’s guilt. But she was reasonable enough to admit it was the jury which had to decide on the case, and not anyone else.

To this day, Mario who is now 61, is adamant he was not the one who stabbed to death the Filipino victim in that gang brawl in Saikung. So resolute was he in denying any culpability that he rejected his lawyer’s suggestion that he plead guilty to manslaughter so he could get off with a much lighter sentence.

But his once fierce proclamation of his innocence is rarely heard nowadays. Having done jail time for a quarter of a century, all he wants now is to be free again, and do things many people have come to take for granted, like using a mobile phone and a computer, or even just to feel the breeze from outside prison blowing in his face again.

Mario has suffered long enough. He should be freed.

Filcom to meet on mandatory SSS, insurance

By Daisy CL Mandap

The Consulate is set to call a meeting of Filipino community leaders on Nov. 11 to discuss concerns about the impending collection of mandatory insurance and SSS contributions from all overseas Filipino workers, who could end up shelling up to $400 per month for both fees.

This was disclosed by Eman Villanueva, secretary general of United Filipinos – Migrante Hong Kong, who said the meeting was requested by his group from Consul General Antonio A. Morales, during a meeting last week.

Unifil has been protesting the impending collections, saying the Philippine government has turned overseas Filipino workers into milking cows.

“Parang tokhang na tuloy ito, papatayin ang mga OFWs sa dami ng mga bayarin. Bakit ayaw tantanan ang mga OFWs?,” Unifil chairperson Dolores Balladares-Pelaez said in a separate interview earlier.

Under the proposed Social Security Act of 2018, all OFWs will have to pay monthly contributions of between Php960 and Php2,400 in mandatory SSS payments.

The bill has already been passed by both houses of Congress, and is just awaiting the signature of President Rodrigo R. Duterte.

Social Security System representative Lester Paul Mata says they expect the enforced collection to start early next year.

He clarified that OFWs can opt to pay only the minimum monthly contribution of Php960, although the corresponding benefits will be smaller than if they paid the Php2,4000 maximum.

On top of the enforced SSS payments, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration passed a resolution on Aug. 28, providing for the collection of mandatory insurance from OFWs each time they sign a job contract, or when renewing existing ones.

Mandatory insurance is currently only enforced for OFWs taking up their first employment abroad. The premium for two years is pegged at US$144 for land-based workers, and US$200 for seafarers.

Unlike the mandatory SSS collection, however, the POEA Resolution could take a longer time to enforce because its implementing rules have yet to be drafted and published as required by law.

Labor Attache Jalilo dela Torre, whose office will effectively be tasked to ensure all OFWs are covered by insurance before they are allowed to process a new work contract, said he has yet to receive instructions on how, or when, the new measure would take effect.

Still, Unifil says protests against the two enforced collections should be made now because it would be difficult to reverse them once they got enforced.

The group also hit out at the apparent haste with which both measures were drafted, and the lack of consultations with OFWs, who will bear the brunt of the additional fee collection.

Villanueva said his group is not against paying for social security or insurance coverage per se, because some OFWs might regard them beneficial, but against making them mandatory.

“For people who can afford the additional expenses and consider them beneficial, fine, but don’t force everyone to pay because there are many who are on a tight budget and may even be still paying off loans incurred so they could work abroad,” said Villanueva.

“Wala ding security of tenure ang mga OFW, so maaaring ang binayad nila ay mapunta sa wala.”

Unifil has been conducting Sunday briefings with migrant workers so they are better informed about the impact and implications of the proposed new fees.

Also on the agenda for the upcoming Filcom meeting, said Villanueva,  is the call of Unifil and its allied organizations for higher wages, better working conditions and welfare provisions for foreign domestic workers, which they want the Consulate to adopt.

On the part of the Consulate officers, they reportedly want to formally introduce their newly arrived colleagues to Filcom members.

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Mideast specialist is new Phl deputy consul general in HK

By Vir B. Lumicao

An old Philippine hand in the Middle East, Germinia Aguilar-Usudan, has been named as the country’s new deputy consul general in Hong Kong.

The 51-year-old Usudan arrived in the city on Oct 17 and reported for work at the Consulate the following day. She has taken over from Consul Roderico Atienza, who is due to end his tour of duty in January.

“I am happy to be in Hong Kong, First World siya in Asia. I look forward to spending six years in Hong Kong,” DCG Usudan said.

The new deputy head at the Consulate told the SUN in an interview that she is a Bicolana who became a Muslim years after marrying her Maranaw husband, Yusuf Usudan, who also worked at the Department of Foreign Affairs but is now retired.

DCG Usudan said she is confident the experience she acquired in her many years in the Middle East will help her serve the Consulate well.

Consul Atienza has welcomed DCG Germi’s arrival, saying “that means we’ve expanded the officer complement in Hong Kong.”

DCG Usudan has served with the DFA for the past 30 years. Before coming here, she was the director of the DFA’s Office of Middle East and African Affairs with focus on the Gulf States.

Her last Middle East posting was a four-year stint in the Saudi commercial capital Jeddah, where she was moved from the embassy in the capital, Riyadh.

She joined the DFA right after graduating from the University of the Philippines in Diliman with an economics degree in 1988. She took the Foreign Service Officers’ Exam in 1996, while studying law at the University of Santo Tomas. She finished law in 1998 and passed the Bar the next year.

“Ang una kong posting ay Abu Dhabi, tapos na-transfer ako sa Riyadh,” DCG Usudan said.

After her recall to Manila, she was posted in Jakarta. “Para maiba naman, kasi parang nata-typecast na ako sa Middle East, so nag-Jakarta ako.”

But two years later, she was again moved to the Middle East, when a Muslim officer was needed in the Saudi city of Jeddah. She spent the last four years of her stay there.

She said that back in the Home Office, she requested for an Asian posting to be closer to her ailing mother. Sadly, her mom passed away in May, before she could be posted in Hong Kong, her destination of choice.

DCG Usudan noted that there are many Filipinos in Hong Kong who look happier than in other posts she had been to, and the Filipino community seems very active in looking for projects that will help the workers.

She said she will be joined in Hong Kong by her two children, Ameerah, 15, who is in grade 9; and Amiruddin, 13, in grade 7, when their classes end in March next year.

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