Open borders

An HIV-positive person was denied entry into our lovely shores by our immigration officials, simply because he had HIV.  If there is anything guaranteed to create even more stigma on people who have had the misfortune of contracting the virus, that would be it.

Marcelino Cavestany flew to the Philippines, reportedly to promote awareness on the dreaded virus that causes AIDS, and to assist in NGO programmes focused on AIDS prevention.  Well, after the humiliating treatment he received when he landed at our airport, one could say he was pretty successful in generating some buzz on HIV and AIDS awareness.

Apparently, the basis of the denial of his entry was a dusty order signed by a former Immigration official (Marcelino Libanan).  But this order was not only erroneous, it was also illegal.  Setting aside the degrading aspect of it for the moment, this piece of paper was (and it is now acknowledged to be) violative of our international commitments.  But what most people (and the press) have been silent on, is that we don’t even need to look to treaties for support, because our domestic law is pretty express on this point. 

The Philippine AIDS Prevention and Control Act (which we technically refer to as Republic Act No. 8504), a bill that was filed and passed more than a dozen years ago, already says that persons cannot be discriminated against on the basis of their HIV-status.

Here’s what the law says:  “The freedom of abode, lodging and travel of a person with HIV shall not be abridged. No person shall be quarantined, placed in isolation, or refused lawful entry into or deported from Philippine territory on account of his/her actual, perceived or suspected HIV status.”  And the penalty for going against this law? Imprisonment for six months to four years, and a small monetary fine.

 Despite the clarity of this mandate against letting a person’s HIV status factor in the decision on whether to admit entry or not, here we have an immigration official blithely signing an order that rests on this status as a basis for his denial.  That, plus various other flunkeys who blindly followed Libanan’s original order, unaware of our international commitment and their legal obligations, resulting in the placing of Cavestany in quarantine. 

Who do we now blame for this unnecessary human rights violation?

Our government is one, and I don’t refer merely to the immigration department.  Whoever it was that signed on to our treaty should have made it a point to disseminate that piece of information to the other branches of government.  Then, there was our legislature, who should have allocated more funds for the enforcement of the AIDS Prevention Act, rather than just relying on NGO activists to carry that burden. 

Of course, we shouldn’t forget that brilliant immigration officer, who signed the order without checking its validity.  Doesn’t our immigration bureau even have a legal department that could have validated the legal basis for the order?  Even if the international treaty was unknown and something hard to research, surely, they could have checked the laws in place before recommending signature of that order.

And if legal clearance hadn’t been obtained, if the bureau’s lawyers hadn’t been consulted, then it makes you wonder what kind of power or influence was exerted on the immigration official, so that he could merrily affix his signature on a document that would eventually end up in the face of a real live person.  Did he perhaps think that the arbitrary treatment of a person in the solitary confines of an airport would never come to light?

On the positive side (absolutely no pun intended), pretty much every ordinary citizen is now aware that no one, not one, can be denied entry into this country on the basis of his or her HIV status.  For bigots who cannot find their compassionate side when it comes to PWA’s (persons with AIDS), that’s one less weapon for them to inflict.  This much, we have to thank our witless officials for.