Three women pretending to be government employees were prevented from boarding their flight to South Korea at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) over fake documents, the Bureau of Immigration (BI) said on Sunday, July 16.
BI Commissioner Norman Tansingco said the three presented travel authorities indicating that they were affiliated with the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR).
Travel authorities are documents that permit government employes to travel for official or personal reasons.
However, inconsistencies in their statements raised suspicions among the BI frontliners, leading them to scrutinize the documents further. They later confessed that they had acquired their documents from a vendor in Quiapo, Manila.
Tansingco expressed his belief that the women had been recruited for illegal work in Korea.
“During the interview, they admitted that they paid P150,000 to a contact they met through Facebook to process their documents,” stated Tansingco.
The investigation revealed that all three travelers were potential victims of human trafficking and illegal recruitment.
Consequently, their case has been referred to the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking for further investigation.
