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Philippine residents might quickly have the ability to enter the United States and not using a visa. This would nevertheless solely apply for journey to Guam, and Northern Mariana Islands- two US territories within the Pacific Ocean.
Gutierrez: USINDOPACOM technique warrants visa waivers for Filipinos
Today Guam Visitors Bureau (GVB) President and CEO Carl TC Gutierrez introduced that the bureau would use the United States Indo-Pacific Command’s overriding protection aims in Guam and the Philippines as leverage to push Washington, DC, for visa waivers for Filipinos in search of to go to Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.
The US Department of Homeland Security’s Guam-CNMI Visa Waiver Program at present permits passport holders of a dozen nations visa-free entry to the unincorporated US territory of Guam and the US Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. Although most visa-waivered international locations on the record are within the Pacific, the Philippines have but to grow to be eligible.
But Gutierrez asserts that US immigration safety considerations have lengthy been outmoded by touring Filipinos’ standing as educated upper-middle-income earners with quickly falling overstay charges and high-tech ePassports outfitted with RFID tags.
In different phrases, social and financial freedom has given rise to greater requirements of dwelling, befitting journey with out visas if to not the US mainland, then not less than to close by Guam and the Northern Marianas, which all fall throughout the identical archipelago.
“US Armed Forces strategy across PACOM’s dual-hemisphere Area of Responsibility requires Guam, the Philippines, and other Pacific access ways as deterrents against China’s communist influence, encroachment, and aggression,” Gutierrez mentioned.
“By rubbing and basing its way across the Pacific, America is defending a way of life that upholds economic freedom and cooperation. And it is by this token that we implore the powers in our nation’s capital to grant Guam and the Philippines’ mutual desire to drop the visa requirement on Filipinos who wish to visit Guam and even the CNMI.”
Manila’s corridors of energy
The announcement comes as House Resolution No. 332 urging US approval for blanket visa waivers for Guam-bound Filipinos makes its means by way of the Philippine Congress. The decision, authored by Cagayan de Oro 2nd District House Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, was launched on September 1st final yr, inside three months of a GVB delegation’s go to to Manila that included ten Guam mayors.
Rodriguez, who served as Deputy Speaker of the House and was appointed commissioner of the Bureau of Immigration by Philippine President Joseph Estrada, was visitor of honor at a dinner hosted by Gutierrez and the Mayors’ Council of Guam in Manila final summer time. Another gathering additionally included 17 mayors from the Philippines and the Governor of Negros Occidental, Eugenio Jose Villarreal Lacson.
The GVB president’s technique is to construct a grassroots community of Guam and Philippine mayors and different public officers to create a groundswell of in style assist that may’t assist however be seen and appreciated by decision-makers from Guam to Manila to Washington.
More lately, Guam Sen. Will Parkinson has launched Resolution No. 14-37 (COR) asking Guam Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero to petition Homeland Security for visa waivers for Filipinos planning journeys to Guam, beneath the authority granted her by Public Law 110-229, the Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008.
Parkinson’s decision states, “the people of Guam recognize and support the need for a Guam-CNMI visa waiver for the Philippines to grow our tourism base, help boost our economic recovery and capture more of the growing tourism market from the Philippines.”
Parkinson has additionally acknowledged publicly that the US navy officers he met with on the island had no drawback together with his push for visa waivers for visiting Filipinos.
“US military contractors have developed an insatiable reliance on skilled Filipino laborers to continue building defense installations in Guam,” Gutierrez mentioned.
“And our village mayors know why. Guam’s Filipino visitor staff symbolize the excessive stage of sophistication that the outbound Philippine journey market has reached. They reside in our civilian villages, make and spend good cash right here on the island, and respect our legal guidelines and customs.
“And GVB statistics show that leisure travelers from the Philippines are among the highest spenders per capita among all Asian visitors whenever their US visa approvals pull through,” Gutierrez mentioned.
Rep. Rodriguez’s decision observes, “upwards of 70,000 Filipinos residing in Guam beckon their families to visit them, and hundreds of H-2B visa workers now residing in Guam also wish to be visited by their families.”
The decision additionally factors out that “U.S. passport holders have long been allowed to enter the Philippines without a visa [and]…the Philippines and the United States remain friendly defense allies and trade partners for mutual freedom and security.”
According to Gutierrez, Guam’s mayors and vice mayors are integral to constructing bilateral relationships with their counterparts within the Philippines and a rock-solid case for Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., his cupboard, and the nationwide congress to point out how visa waivers will probably be good for the Philippines and Guam, together with every locations’ financial safety.
“GVB extends its sincerest gratitude to Rep. Rodriguez and Sen. Parkinson for supporting our push to increase the Guam-CNMI Visa Waiver program to the Philippines, Gutierrez mentioned.
“The Pacific community of islands cannot be expected to sacrifice precious resources to play host to the most powerful defense force on earth with one arm tied behind our back economically. No one knows our needs better than those in these communities. There has to be given and taken.”
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