Last trip

Vague DFA evacuation plan angers Aquino

By ROY C. MABASA

March 3, 2011, 6:35pm

MANILA, Philippines — Take the chartered ship to be sent to the port in Benghazi on Saturday lest you miss the last trip that the Philippine government is providing to evacuate from Libya.
This was the appeal of Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario to overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) still in the strife-torn country as Libyan border crossings were overwhelmed Wednesday by tens of thousands of hungry, fearful people fleeing its burgeoning civil war.
UN refugee agency spokeswoman Melissa Fleming told The Associated Press that over 180,000 refugees have reached the border. Over 77,300 people have crossed east from Libya into Egypt, most of them Egyptians, while a similar number have fled west from Libya into Tunisia, she said. Another 30,000 more were still waiting in Libya at the border, trying to get into Tunisia.
“We are setting a time frame for ourselves so we are saying that people should get out by Saturday,” Del Rosario said in an interview. “This may be the last effort that we will make for Tripoli because we think that the people who have not gone out by this time have decided to stay there.”
“We have the facilities for them to get out so we encourage them: get on that boat because we may not be coming back for you anymore,” he stressed.
He said there are actually Filipinos who have decided to stay in Libya despite the evacuation and repatriation efforts of the government.
“There are some who will want to play it safe and some who want to take it to the edge, we do not know,” Del Rosario said.
He pointed out that this fact has been determined because the chartered vessel, MV Ionian Queen, that went to Benghazi last Tuesday to take OFWs to the Greek island of Crete was only half full.
Del Rosario said this maybe because the situation in Benghazi has significantly improved: the shops began to open, the banks started opening, the police has started coming out and they think that the situation has normalized.
“I think that is not probably the case. I think if they have this opportunity to get out they should take it,” he stated.

Heads to roll at DFA
As this developed, heads are expected to roll at the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) for their supposed failure to act decisively at the onset on the evacuation and repatriation Filipino workers in Libya.
This was learned from well placed sources both in Malacañang and the DFA who disclosed that President Benigno S. Aquino III did not hesitate to express his anger and dismay over the apparent vagueness in evacuation and repatriation plans presented to him by DFA Undersecretary for Migrant Workers Esteban Conejos Jr. and other concerned government officials.
On two occasions prior to Del Rosario's trip to Tunisia last Friday to personally oversee the evacuation of OFWs in Libya, the President summoned Conejos and officials from Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA), Department of Labor and Employment (DoLE), and the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) to Malacañang to get an appraisal of their plan of actions regarding the evacuation and repatriation of OFWs in Libya.
Aquino called for the meeting as he expressed dismay over the pronouncements being made by Conejos in the media, particularly the inconsistencies in the figures being presented.
The President was supposed to have singled out Conejos during the meeting for the public pronouncements which sowed more confusion rather than being informative.
Even media covering the diplomatic beat were at a loss as to the inadequacy of information being presented by both Conejos and DFA spokesman Ed Malaya.
Sources also disclosed that the President was unconvinced about the plans being broached by Conejos and other officials involved in the evacuation as they cannot even explain the distance between the cities of Benghazi and Tripoli as they were showing the Chief Executive a map of Libya.
“Those are mere scraps of papers. Have you been to that place yourself?” sources quoted a fuming President asking Conejos.
Conejos admitted to the President that he has never been to Libya.
Adding to the President's ire was the reported the inaccessibility of the current ambassador to Libya who was not even heard or seen in public since the Libyan crisis erupted. The DFA website listed Alejandrino Vicente as the Philippine envoy to Libya.
Sources even went on to surmise that Del Rosario's decision to personally take a trip to Libya could have been triggered the President's dressing down of Conejos and other government officials.
Aside from Conejos, those who were present at the meeting were Labor Secretary Rosalinda D. Baldoz, POEA Administrator Carlos S. Cao Jr., and Del Rosario, among others.
The foreign affairs secretary, who returned to Manila on Monday after personally overseeing the repatriation operations of the government in Tunisia and Tripoli, disclosed that they have set up a center right next to the Philippine Embassy in Tripoli.
Del Rosario said there are 300 people at an evacuation center in Benghazi now but may balloon to a thousand by the time the chartered boat comes in for the second time.
“But hopefully, we can get more if this is in fact the clean-up stage in terms of bringing people out,” Del Rosario said.
However, he said they will have to be careful because there is a planned pro-government demonstration within the week that is going to be near the harbor.
“So we are trying to make plans so that the boarding of the ship does not take place before or during the said demonstration. We will instead wait maybe for the next day. Right now, we are trying to convince the shipping company that we would like to wait another day before we board that ship.”
He stressed that it is not dangerous for a ship to go to Tripoli at this time.
“It is safer to board the ship in the port since Libyan leader Col Moammar Khaddafy is using Tripoli as his strong hold and not Benghazi.”
He said close to 10,000 out of the 26,000 OFWs believed to be in Libya are being repatriated.
This is so because conflict is only concentrated on the northern coastal areas, Del Rosario said.
“For example in areas such as central Libya or in southern Libya, these are deemed to be safe areas. No conflicts there right now,” he said. “So our advise is if you are in those areas maybe you should consider staying there. It may be more risky for you to travel than to just stay where you are.”
Jolie appeals
Angelina Jolie, a United Nations goodwill ambassador for refugees, appealed Wednesday for all nations to give people safe passage, evacuation if needed, and ensure they have asylum.
“All I'm asking is that civilians be protected, and not targeted or harmed,” the actress said. “We don't want to look back and find their deaths are on our hands.”
Among those stranded at the Tunisian border were Bangladeshi, Vietnamese, Filipinos, and Ghanaians, and 2,400 more Africans at Tumo on the Libyan side of the border with Niger. Another 4,000 people, mostly Nigerians, were stranded around the Libyan coastal city of Miserata. (With a report from AP)