Due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) has accumulated an estimated 2.3 million “backlog” in the issuance of Philippine passports worldwide.
DFA Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs Senen Mangalile made this disclosure on Friday, Sept. 25, amid widespread complaints about the Department’s alleged inefficiency in handling online applications and releasing of passports not only in the various consular sites in the Philippines but also in some of the country's major foreign posts.
Based on their analysis, Mangalile said the backlog were evident in the difference between the numbers of passports they issued during pre-pandemic period in 2019 versus those issued in 2020.
“In 2019 we were able to release more than four million passports. In 2020, because of the pandemic we were able to release only 1.7 million passports. The difference, which is somewhere around 2.3 million, are the ones we consider as backlogs,” Mangalile told reporters during a virtual media briefing.
As for this year from January up to Aug. 31, the DFA has already issued around 1.7 million.
The DFA official, however, clarified that it does not necessarily follow that the difference of 2.3 million applications have reached or are pending with the Department.
“Historically, there is still something like 2.3 million passports which should have been issued under normal circumstances,” he said.
Apart from the challenges that the DFA is facing in providing smooth passport application, processing and delivery services under the current crisis, Mangalile also admitted that they have also received a staggering over 26,000 passport applications with errors in the names and dates of birth of applicants.
The bulk of the erroneous applications has piled up at the DFA and may need to require the affected applicants to seek another online schedule, which does not come easy nowadays.
This, according to Mangalile, is because they have limited number of staff tasked to correct these errors.
"Hindi na namin kakayanin (We can no longer be able), within a reasonable turn around time, ang pag correct ng kanilang application (to correct their application). Yung 26,000 napababa namin ng 17,000 (We were able to reduce the 26,000 to 17,000). The applicants were given info that there will be a delay in release of their passports,” he said.