Bureau of Immigration (BI) Commissioner Norman Tansingco on Wednesday, Sept. 6, defended immigration officers for intercepting Mohammad Said last Aug. 10 at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).

In a statement, Tansingco said that "Said was intercepted for being the subject of an Interpol red notice issued in 2017.”  

“We cannot add or delete anything from these derogatory records as our role is to implement what is included by authorized agencies,” he stressed.

The statement was issued in response to the Sept. 5 privilege speech of Sen. Robin Padilla who accused the BI of arresting 61-year-old Said at the NAIA's Terminal 3.

Padilla insisted that Said, who was supposed to depart for Malaysia, was mistook as Ama Maas who has been linked to heinous crimes but had already died in 2016 during a military operation in Sulu.

The senator also said that Said already has a clearance of no derogatory record from the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and has been repeatedly traveled to and from the country.

But Tansingco said "the actions of the immigration officers were well within their roles, given that all the details of the derogatory record matched.”

“The said record contained Said’s full name, sex, date of birth, place of birth, and even his passport number,” he said.

At the same time, Tansingco clarified that immigration officers do not make arrests at the airports against persons with derogatory records.

“It is the local law enforcement agencies—the NBI and the PNP (Philippine National Police)—that are authorized to conduct arrests,” he explained.

He pointed out that immigration officers only implement derogatory records as received from courts, the Interpol, foreign governments, and other competent authorities.

Persons found with derogatory records are only turned over by immigration officers to law enforcement agencies which conduct the investigation and implement the arrest, he said.