This story
was taken from Bulatlat, the Philippines's alternative weekly
newsmagazine (www.bulatlat.com, www.bulatlat.net, www.bulatlat.org).
Vol. VI, No. 9, April 2-8, 2006
MIGRANT WATCH
Filipinos in U.S. Denounce Anti-immigrant Bill
Immigrants in the United States are said to be the targets of a new bill in the
U.S. Congress which essentially criminalizes undocumented persons and penalizes
those who will take care of them. Given that there are four million Filipinos in
the U.S. and about 60,000 Filipinos go to the U.S. yearly, it is not surprising
that Filipinos are the main participants in protest actions against the proposed
bill. BY
AUBREY SC MAKILAN Filipinos in the United
States declared that they will support the call for a general strike called “A
Day without Immigrants,” if the U.S. Senate will pass the anti-immigrant
Sensenbrenner Bill. Immigrants who joined the historic California march on March
25 also vowed to continue staging protests until the bill is junked. Although media reports said
that only up to 500,000 went out to protest on March 25, more than a million
immigrants actually flooded the streets of Los Angeles to demand for equal
rights for all immigrants, said Chito Quijano of the Los Angeles chapter of
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic Alliance). The protest is said to be
the largest mobilization in the history of California. It was organized by a
broad coalition of immigrant organizations including Bayan-USA, an alliance of
Filipino organizations in the U.S. Quijano, also a health
union organizer for the California Nurses Association in Los Angeles, described
the march as that of the first Edsa Revolution of 1986. He said that the
Filipino contingent, composed of professionals and low-wage workers, planned to
march together but they did not find each other because of the thick crowd. As early as 8 a.m., Quijano
said that people filled the Olympic and Broadway avenues, the starting point of
the march. The whole stretch of Broadway Avenue was already impassable by 10 a.m,
he said. Filipinos were among the crowd of mainly Latinos. HR 4437 The immigrants opposed U.S.
House Resolution 4437, also known at the Sensenbrenner Bill (Border Protection,
Anti-Terror, and Illegal Immigration Bill). HR 4437 was introduced by
Congressman James Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, on
Dec. 6. The U.S. House of Representative passed this resolution with a 239 to
182 vote on Dec. 16. In an email interview with
Bulatlat, Berna Ellorin of Bayan-USA described this bill as “perhaps the
most Draconian anti-immigrant bill we have seen in a long time” which
“(essentially criminalizes) undocumented persons and those who offer assistance
to them.” Based on Bayan-USA
statement, “the bill will criminalize caring individuals, churches, charities,
community groups, and similar service organizations that give humanitarian
assistance to families without legal residence status.” Moreover, it said, “the
bill will also allow the government to seize the properties of these individuals
and organizations because they did not thoroughly check the legal resident and
immigration status of people before providing assistance.” “And we have one of the
largest undocumented populations in the country,” she said, given that 60,000
Filipinos enter the U.S. annually. “So we stand to be hit hard by any bill that
comes our way, more than other immigrant communities.” At present, Ellorin said,
the U.S. Senate’s judiciary committee presented a version of the bill to the
Senate for debate, but replaced the criminalization clause with a temporary
guest worker provision. Ellorin however said that the “people’s movement in the
streets needs to keep the pressure on” as the controversial clause could be
reversed during the deliberations at the U.S. Senate. Silent RP officials Filipinos in the U.S. are
active in the ongoing nationwide demonstrations denouncing immigration bills
such as the Sensenbrenner Bill. They lambasted the Macapagal-Arroyo
administration for not taking a position against the criminalization of
undocumented immigrants in
Washington. Quijano said, “Filipinos
remain an open target for such blanket repression in host countries abroad
because the Philippine government has no real program of protection for overseas
Filipinos.” In fact,
based on reports from the New York Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines
(NYCHRP), 11 foreign ministers from overseas remittance-receiving countries in
Latin America have joined the campaign against the Sensenbrenner-King Bill and
the fight for the legalization and upholding of civil rights of undocumented
immigrants. NYCHRP commended the eleven Latin American countries – Colombia,
Mexico, Panama, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Ecuador, Belize, Nicaragua,
Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic – which are taking note of the critical
debate in the Senate this month and "are being pro-active for the interest and
protection of their nationals." Ellorin said that these 11
foreign ministers even approached Consulate General Cecilia Rebong to remark on
a definitive RP government position on the immigration debate. But she said
Rebong only uttered, "just as the U.S. government does not intervene in our
internal political affairs, we must refrain from intervening on this issue.” Despite having
the most overseas remittance-dependent economy in the world and
ranking third among the highest labor-exporting countries, “they (Filipino
officials) do nothing but be silent when it comes to protecting us from the
backlash of anti-immigrant laws that the US Senate is debating on," said Robyn
Rodriguez of the NYCHRP. Rodriguez
said that earlier this year, Philippine Ambassador Albert del Rosario was
praising Filipinos in the U.S. for churning in a total of $5.3 billion in
remittances to the Philippines in 2005 alone, comprising 60 percent of the total
remittances to the Philippines. "Arroyo prioritizes the dollars that we send
home, but could care less about our rights and welfare,” he said.
Earlier in 2006,
the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution commemorating 100 years of
sustained Filipino migration to the U.S.
"It is sustained because the economic crisis in the Philippines remains
unresolved," said Bayan-USA chair Kawal Ulanday, who participated in a hunger
strike called by the Bay Area Immigrant Rights Coalition in San Francisco.
"The Arroyo administration
has a long history of taking from but not giving back to OFWs (overseas Filipino
workers) and because of this pattern we see a record-breaking number of OFW
deaths, disappearances, and human rights violations under her regime," Rodriguez
said. “This is a glaring reason why there is such a loud clamor from overseas
Filipinos who want Arroyo out of office." Filipinos’ force
With the
Philippine officials’ silence on the issue, Ellorin said that “it is the
people’s organizations that have been conducting critical work educating,
organizing, and mobilizing compatriots around this issue.” He said that a
discussion guide on the Sensenbrenner Bill is posted on Bayan-USA’s website at
www.bayanusa.org.” Rodriguez said that
these have been exemplified by the massive turn-out of protest actions in
Los Angeles,
Chicago, Wisconsin, and Washington DC.
Justice 4
Immigrants Filipino Coalition (J4I) has been at the forefront of organizing
initiatives in the Filipino community against the Sensenbrenner Bill when it
passed the House vote last December. Aside from hosting meetings about the bill
for the last three months, J4I is also initiating more critical action from
Filipinos demanding earned legalization, swift family reunification and an end
to criminalization and deportation of immigrants.
The coalition is composed of
concerned Filipino organizations and
individuals in
New York and
neighboring areas such as Philippine Forum, NYCHRP, Anakbayan Filipino Youth,
Kinding Sindaw Cultural Troupe, Migrante International, Movement for a Free
Philippines, Sandiwa Filipino Youth and the Critical Filipino/Filipina Studies
Collective.
Several Filipino business-owners from restaurants such as Perlas Ng Silangan,
Ihawan, Krystal's, Renee's Kitchenette and others have already committed to
participating in the street gathering and will donate refreshments for the open
community gathering called “Pagtitipon para sa Legalisasyon” (Gathering for
Legalization) on April 2 at Roosevelt Avenue. Bayan-USA said that 95 percent of
the businesses between 69th and 70th streets in this
avenue are Filipino-owned, thus considered the Filipino commercial district in
New York. If the Senate will pass
this law, Filipinos in the U.S. under the umbrella organizations Bayan-USA and
Migrante International, will support the call for a general strike dubbed as “A
Day without Immigrants.” Bayan-USA also pledged to join the upcoming protests
like the May 1 mobilization in Southern California. Back home In the Philippines,
Migrante International, an
alliance of groups composed of
overseas Filipinos and their families which include Filipino organizations in
the U.S, said that protest actions at the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA)
and the
U.S. embassy are
underway along with efforts to raise awareness about the effects of the
Sensbrenner-King Bill on immigrants.
"We're also
uniting with immigrant groups from other nationalities to mount the strongest
opposition to this anti-migrant bill as well as other repressive legislation
that targets migrants," said Connie Bragas-Regalado, Migrante International
chairperson, citing lobbying of
legislators in the Lower House.These
include coordinated protest actions in the U.S. and releasing of a Filipino
version of Bayan-USA’s primer, she said. Bulatlat © 2006 Bulatlat
■
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Bulatlat
She said that Filipinos could be part of the “undocumented population” because
the U.S. Census reports only three million Filipinos when actually there are
four million of them in the U.S.