Bureau of Immigration dusts off plan to relocate headquarters to Pasay

MANILA, Philippines - The Bureau of Immigration (BI) has revived a plan to relocate its main office from Intramuros, Manila to Diosdado Macapagal Avenue in Pasay City due to the increasing volume of people transacting at the agency daily, officials said yesterday.

BI Commissioner Ricardo David Jr. said he has directed his staff to undertake a feasibility study into the proposed project as it will require a hefty budget from the national government.

He said funding for the project has to be appropriated by Congress and that the building will be constructed in a large vacant lot near the SM Mall of Asia the BI acquired a few years ago.

“Our present space and facilities at the Intramuros office are no longer enough to accommodate our transactions, hence the need for a new building that is conducive to the delivery of fast and efficient service to the public,” David said in a statement.

He said the idea of building a new BI headquarters dates back to the time of former BI commissioner and now Cagayan de Oro Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, who initially sought the transfer of the bureau’s head office to the Bonifacio Global City in Taguig.

BI Associate Commissioner Siegfred Mison, who is spearheading the study, said the proposed building should be designed in conformity with the new immigration law now pending in Congress.

Mison said the proposed bill provides for the employment of 3,000 immigration employees, compared to its present manpower of only over a thousand personnel. He also said that the bureau’s division and section chiefs were already instructed to submit a list and number of personnel based on the proposed immigration act and a diagram of the workers’ functions and workflow.

The inputs will then be consolidated and submitted to the Department of Public Works and Highways, which will come up with the architectural and engineering design of the planned structure.