[OPINION] The visa nightmare and Filipinos' need for more potent passports

I am entirely conscious that there are different, more significant pressing troubles our authorities have to consciousness on and resolve than the passport trouble. Grinding poverty. Human trafficking. Graft and corruption. Environmental degradation. Peace and stability. Advocacies of our beauty queens. These are persistent troubles that could take more significant than an era to restore, so as callous as it can sound, I might want to head on vacation for now.

I’m positive that there are nevertheless a lot of us accessible who – after paying our hard-earned taxes hoping that they might be used accurately, most straightforward to be squandered with the aid of our lawless lawmakers in the end – might need to indulge ourselves in a chunk of traveling out of doors the confines of our archipelago. In this regard, I, in my view, would like to understand whether our government, via its Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), has any plans of creating tours out of doors in the Philippines less complicated and less annoying for any Filipino vacationer.

The predominant hurdle for any Philippine passport holder is too comfortable a visa to any foreign united states of America. That is exceedingly evident from all the prison files he or she has to provide you with before going to the consulate or embassy for the normal interview or appearance. Even though the Philippine passport allows its bearer to enter as many as sixty-four international locations and territories visa-free or visa-on-arrival, many countries still stay out of attaining for Filipino vacationers if they do no longer first achieve the necessary consular visas to the nations they intend to visit.

In today’s world where privacy has to grow to be an overgrowing situation, Juan has to unwillingly naked all and lose all – his privacy as a personal character and his dignity as a man or woman. Many of us who’ve had the enjoyment of securing a visa to visit an overseas usa can attest to how it can be cumbersome and downright demeaning to go through the system, especially when touring to a first world us of a. We had to obtain a stack of files from fitness certificates or evidence of vaccination to profits tax and financial institution statements showing our commercial belongings and liabilities.

Some of us even needed to go oceans to seem at a visa workplace, consulate, or embassy to percentage our biometric data and then be subjected to an interrogation, which could now and then is humiliating. How lengthy do you want to live? Do you have enough cash? Do you’ve got a credit score card? What guarantee are you able to supply me to show which you’re coming returned after your journey? These are a few questions that every Filipino visitor has to master answering below near scrutiny, preferably with a Bb Pilipinas candidate’s poise and elegance. A slip-up or an unraveling of nerves all through this interview ought to spell the distinction between going home empty-exceeded and prevailing the enormously coveted visa.

I had been lucky enough to have legitimate American and Schengen visas in my passport. Having the ones, two visas has allowed me to tour more nations than my Philippine passport might permit me. For instance, I have traveled to Georgia in the Caucasus using my US or Schengen visa. I even have difficulty applying online for e-visas (digital visas) for the United Arab Emirates and Turkey. E-visas had been an awesome comfort for lots 1/3 global passport holders as securing them is cheaper and simpler. You need to complete a shape on-line, pay the visa charge, and print the e-visa.

Turkey, for instance, has been granting e-visas to Philippine passport holders supplied that the Filipino traveler has a legitimate US or Schengen visa. Having both permissions on your Philippine passport may also permit you to enter Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosovo, Mexico, Panama, Romania, and Serbia, amongst other states, without having to apply for separate visas for those countries. My factor is, Juan the Pinoy tourist could no longer be capable of earning the one’s more magnificent typical flyer miles if his Philippine passport didn’t have a US or Schengen visa.

If it is no longer viable for our puny Philippine passports to be considered totally for entry to an overseas us of a, does our government have any plans of extending the list of nations that could allow us to secure an e-visa online, not less than? For example, Azerbaijan, a neighboring Turkey country, allows certain nations to apply and obtain an e-visa online. With its collapsed financial system and unstable political regime, citizens of Venezuela can still enter the Schengen area visa-unfastened and nonetheless experience the ownership of having the 38th maximum effective passport in the international. This permits them to go into 134 countries and territories without a visa or visa-upon-arrival; 70 international locations are greater than what Philippine passport holders are entitled to as of the instant. (READ: Why I’m pleased with my Philippine passport)

I understand that it takes extra than properly and solid economics and effective bilateral relations for visa reciprocity to be extended to the Philippines. Is there any plan at least to grow the credibility of our Philippine passport inside the foreseeable future? When tourists appear at the immigration counter inside the airport of you. S. A. They’re traveling; they’re ordinarily judged on what passport they’re carrying.

Japan and Singapore have the maximum powerful passports inside the globe today. When Japanese tourists present themselves in front of the immigration counter, the immigration officer, without even uttering a word, quickly stamps their passports and allows them to thru. The identical cannot be stated for Juan de la Cruz or Ursula Ortiz, who has to undergo every other round of Q&A at the immigration counter. (READ: Japan has the world’s most powerful passport, according to this index)

While it’s far real that having a more effective Philippine passport may be exploited by some Filipinos to go into after which live to paintings illegally out of the country, the Philippine authorities should no longer use this as an excuse to collectively punish all Filipinos while allowing their loved ones to enjoy the advantages of diplomatic passports.