Phillipines dismisses claims 16,000 illegal Filipinos in PNG

Updated November 13, 2009 17:55:59

In Papua New Guinea, It's been a bad week for the Philippine embassy there. PNG's Post Courier newspaper published a front page story earlier in the week, claiming there are 16-thousand Filipinos living illegally in the country. The Philippine ambassador to PNG vehemently denies the figures and says it's impossible the number could be anywhere near that high. The allegations come as the PNG government continues its investigation into anti-Asian rioting.

Presenter: Anna Walker
Speaker: Shirley Ho-Vicario, Philippine Ambassador to PNG

WALKER: The Philippine ambassador to PNG, Shirley Ho-Vicario, says it's been a very low week for the Filipino community in the country.

She woke up on Tuesday to a front page story headlined '16,000 aliens: more than 80 per cent of Filipinos living illegally in PNG'.

The story stated Ms Ho-Vicario exposed the figure at the Parliamentary Bipartisan Committee investigating anti-Asian riots in PNG.

But the ambassador says she wasn't even at the inquiry - something the Post Courier has since apologised for.

HO-VICARIO: We wrote a letter direct to the editor in chief of the Post Courier, vehemently denying all of the reports, stating that there are more than 80% of Filipinos are living illegally in PNG, and we were so surprised to get these figures of about 19,000 Filipinos are here in PNG and 16,000 are illegals? When in fact and in truth we don't have that much Filipinos over here.

WALKER; At Monday's hearing, one of the committee's members, Philip Kikala, briefly raised the issue of illegal workers in PNG, without naming the Philippines.

The ABC's Port Moresby office spoke with Mr Kikala after his comments.

He told them the comments he made were in relation to the Philippines and that he was told them at a lunch meeting about a month ago between committee members and foreign representatives in PNG.

Mr Kikala refused to speak with Pacific Beat today.

The Philippine ambassador to PNG wants to see more responsible journalism in the country.

HO-VICARIO: Whenever there is a story, it is always like we want to sell your newspaper, but I don't think the Post Courier has that intention to hurt us. We are here, we're making friends, we don't want to make enemies out of anybody so we just want to check the authenticity of the report and responsible journalists should make sure that the next time that he will do this.

WALKER: Shirley Ho-Vicario says she's received an apology from the Committee for the misunderstanding and says her embassy is working with the foreign affairs department to get to the bottom of the blunder.

HO-VICARIO: According to the deputy prime minister, this will not tarnish nor taint the relations that have been getting stronger between our two countries. They will do its best to check on this report so I leave it to the hands of the government. I know and I understand that they are doing their best also.

WALKER: According to 2007 embassy figures, there were around 10,000 Filipinos living in PNG, and 2,850 undocumented workers - no where near the 16-thousand quoted in the Post Courier.

Shirley Ho-Vicario says there's no way of knowing what that number is now.

HO-VICARIO: Well we do not have a list illegal filipinos over here in PNG, but we cannot deny that there are some on business visa and tourist visa who come in here and eventually landed on a job but on our records we only have a list of those employment contracts that are being authenticated by our embassy so we have a list of more than 10,000 documented workers and I understand there are also about nearly 600 or 800 dependents from these workers.

WALKER: The Post Courier newspaper refused to comment on its story.

Ms Ho-Vicario says bilateral relations between the two countries have never been stronger and puts the issue down to poor journalism.