ZAMBOANGA City Mayor Maria Isabelle Climaco-Salazar said she has formally asked the intervention of President Rodrigo Duterte on issues and concerns arising from the massive repatriation of thousands of undocumented Filipinos from Malaysia.
Salazar’s request was coursed through Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Judy Taguiwalo.
Records showed over 7,000 undocumented Filipinos had been rounded up in Malaysia and will soon be repatriated back to the country with Zamboanga City as the last port of call via Tawi-Tawi.
Salazar, in a letter addressed to Duterte, specifically recommended that reception and processing of repatriates be undertaken in Bongao, Tawi-Tawi, instead of sending them all to Zamboanga City.
In as much as the city is willing to extend more support in receiving repatriates from Malaysia, the mayor said the City Government still has 18,125 internally displaced persons to attend to in 11 transitory sites as they wait for the completion and turnover of 6,483 houses as a result of the Zamboanga siege in 2013.
Salazar explained due to the limit of the city’s absorptive capacity, because of the siege victims, the city can assist only 500 repatriates, based on the capacity of the DSWD processing center in Talon-Talon, who are from the city and nearby areas of the Zamboanga Peninsula. (Bong Garcia/VoxPop Philippines)