BORACAY – Foreigners working in this world-famous island should secure a mayor’s permit or they would face deportation, warned Mayor Abram Sualog of Malay, Aklan.
Sualog – who took oath as the town’s chief executive last week after Ciceron Cawaling’s dismissal for neglecting Boracay’s ecological health – said a working visa is a prerequisite for acquiring the mayor’s permit.
This week, an ad-hoc committee will start inspecting island establishments allegedly employing foreign workers without permits, added Sualog.
The committee – created during the Boracay Inter-Agency Task Force meeting last Thursday – is composed of representatives from the Department of Labor and Employment, Department of Tourism, Department of Trade and Industry, and Department of Interior and Local Government, among others.
“If the foreign worker is found without permit and working visa, and the Bureau of Immigration is there, they will be immediately deported,” Sualog said in a press briefing on Friday.
Tourism secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat, in the same press conference, said three foreign workers were caught without permits last Holy Week.
Sualog noted that there is a local ordinance requiring Boracay establishments “to prioritize the locals and the residents” by sourcing 40 percent of their workforce from Malay. (With a report from PNA/PN)
