The Bureau of Immigration (BI) officials saved another Filipina who may have been a victim of a mail-order bride scheme at Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).
The immigration protection and border enforcement section (I-PROBES) reported that the female passenger was intercepted at NAIA Terminal 3 on 15 March before she could board a China Southern Airlines bound for Guangzhou, China.
According to the I-PROBES, the victim, whose identity was concealed, allegedly stated that she intended to travel to China to join her supposed spouse.
Allegedly, the victim showed a marriage license as evidence of the couple's civil wedding, which is said to have happened at Pasig City Hall in January of last year.
“As per the marriage certificate, the wedding was solemnized by a female preacher, but in a wedding picture she presented, that solemnizing officer appears to be a man,” the I-PROBES said in its report.
Eventually, she acknowledged that the marriage was fake and that it was set up by a fixer who specializes in finding Filipinas willing to marry Chinese people.
The victim also confessed that prior to the trip of her alleged “husband” to the Philippines, the two had not yet met, nor had they entered into a long-distance relationship as lovers.
She further stated that she was promised by her recruiter that she would receive half a million pesos upon her arrival in China in exchange for marrying her foreign spouse.
BI Commissioner Norman Tansingco had earlier warned Filipinas against falling prey to mail-order bride syndicates, as they often end up working as domestic helpers and being subjected to unfair labor practices by their employer-spouse.
He stressed that the racket had already victimized Filipinas, who were induced to join the scheme due to promises of large sums of money that were not fulfilled when they arrived at their foreign destinations.