By Jun Ramirez
Bureau of Immigration (BI) intelligence operatives have arrested an overstaying Jordanian who duped two poor Filipinas into giving him their life’s savings after promising them with high paying jobs in the Middle East.
Bureau of Immigration (MANILA BULLETIN)
Immigration intelligence chief Fortunato Manahan Jr. said 40-year-old Tarek El Abed Albarghouti was arrested recently in General Santos City by operatives from the BI’s Mindanao Intelligence Task Group (MITG).
Manahan said the Jordanian was apprehended on the strength of a mission order from BI Commissioner Jaime Morente who issued the same after learning of the foreigner’s illegal status.
Albarghouti is presently detained at the holding facility of BI’s immigration district office in Davao City while undergoing deportation proceedings for being an overstaying alien.
“A check in our travel database showed that he had been overstaying in the country for more than five years as he has never departed since he arrived here on April 22, 2014,” Manahan said.
According to MITG head Melody Gonzales, Albourghati was the subject of a deportation complaint of two women who claimed the former swindled them of more than P30,000 which he refused to return despite their repeated demand.
Albourghati allegedly asked for the money as payment for processing and facilitating the women’s departure to Dubai where they were purportedly recruited to work as hotel reservation officers.
It was learned during his arrest that the Jordanian is already an undocumented alien as his passport had expired on March 19 this year.
“He also admitted that he did not bother to apply for an extension of his stay as a tourist since he arrived in the country,” Gonzales said.
Morente again urged the public to not hesitate in reporting to the BI the activities of “undesirable aliens who prey on Filipinos in their own country.”