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RP, Japanese recruiters to police ranks for human trafficking
By Veronica Uy
November 23, 2004
Legitimate Philippine and Japanese recruitment agencies said they would police
their ranks to stop the trafficking of women, a Filipino recruiter said.
Lorenzo Langomez, vice president of the Confederated Associations of Licensed
Entertainment Agencies (CALEA), said that in their meetings from November 16 to
19 in Tokyo, they rejected the US State Department’s assessment that Japan and
the Philippines failed to curb human trafficking.
The State Department claimed that those with entertainer visas were forced into
sexual exploitation, prostitution, and hard labor.
Langomez, concurrent president of the Philippine Association of Recruitment
Agencies Deploying Artists (PARADA), said similar organizations like the United
Organization of Overseas Artists Agencies and the Foreign Performing Artists
Professional Promoters and Club Owners Association, and Gaishokyo agreed that
the US State Department’s accusation was "unjust and without basis."
They said their businesses were "legitimate, lawful, and beneficial to the
economies of both countries."
To rid their ranks of misfits and undesirables, Philippine and Japanese
recruitment groups said they would exert "utmost efforts to police their ranks
and institute drastic reforms."
They also urged the governments of Japan and the Philippines to see the
entertainment industry in a different light.
CALEA president Pia Alonzo said her group and various Japanese associations
agreed to strengthen joint initiatives to eliminate practices that they said
had become the source of criticisms in the industry.
CALEA chairperson Christie Gatchalian-Buan said their group would implement the
Comprehensive Orientation Program for Performing Artists (COPPA), a two-day
orientation course for Japan-bound overseas Filipino workers.
She said this was one of their strategies to fully prepare entertainers for
their work in Japan.
Immigration statistics show that about 250,000 aliens are overstaying in Japan.
In 2004, about 130,000 foreigners entered the country on entertainer visas,
with 60 percent of them, or 80,000, coming from the Philippines. Of this
number, 12,000 are believed to be overstaying.
Alonzo said CALEA would meet with its Japanese counterparts again, this time in
Manila in early December.
She said the series of meetings would finalize measures on how the overseas
entertainment sector could help the Philippine and Japanese governments
overcome the negative impact of the US State Department report on human
trafficking.
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