NEWSFLASH

Manila, Aug. 2, 2000 - The British government has scrapped its plan requiring visitors from the Philippines and Morocco to post individual bonds of $7,000 to discourage them from overstaying their visa.

British Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Keith Vaz announced in the House of Commons on Friday that the scheme was being dropped, Immigration Commissioner Rufus Rodriguez said yesterday as he lauded the British government for heeding the protest against the planned $7,000 bond requirement for tourists.

The British move came as a surprise as Vaz had earlier dismissed protests from affected countries as “absolute rubbish and nonsense.”

The pilot scheme, which London planned to initially cover Philippines and Morocco, would have made a visitor from the two countries pay a cash bond ranging from 3,000 to 10,000 British pounds that would be forfeited should the visitor overstayed his visa.

Rodriguez had earlier urged Malacañang and the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) to protest London’s bond scheme, calling it “prohibitive, discriminatory and unreasonable.”

The measure was “primarily designed not only to discourage Filipinos from visiting the UK but also to insult the dignity of Filipino travelers,” Rodriguez said.

He prodded the DFA to retaliate by either imposing a similar cash bond on British tourists entering the Philippines or barred them altogether from coming to Manila.