Eulo Regala’s long way home

Eulo Regala wants to come home.

In an exclusive interview with The STAR, the retired Fil-Am veteran of the Metropolitan Basketball Association reveals that has been banned from entering the Philippines for 21 years, for reasons he has never fully understood. He says that he has never even been given a chance to come back to show that he was wrongfully accused.

“Towards the end of my contract in 2000, I got hurt, so I went back here (to the US),” explains Regala, a hard-working, versatile player for the Negros Slashers, Cagayan de Oro Amigos and Surigao Warriors from 1998 to 2000. “About three weeks later, I start getting phone calls from relatives saying that I’m on the news in the Philippines, that I had been blacklisted for using a fake working visa. I didn’t know anything about that. To this day, I’m still on the blacklist.”

Regala, whose grandfather and father are both Filipinos, was deeply hurt by what happened. The Bureau of Immigration, then under Commissioner Rufus Rodriguez, banned him and other Fil-foreign players like Negros teammate Dean Labayen from ever returning, seemingly without due process. This was also at the height of congressional hearings on fake Fil-Am basketball players under Senators Robert Barbers, Sonny Osmeña and Robert Jaworski. Years later, Labayen attempted to return to the country, but was stopped at the airport, detained for a few hours, and forced to leave again.

On Thursday, the Games and Amusements Board through Chairman Baham Mitra and Professional Sports Division head Dioscoro Bautista, released a certification that Regala was indeed issued a Professional Basketball Player’s License which legally allowed him to play in the MBA back then. Regala is now working to reassert his Filipino citizenship, as has not been allowed to return for decades now. It seems that whoever recruited him to play in the country used his American passport and did not follow proper documentation procedure. But since he is a dual citizen, simply proving that he is Filipino should nullify the case. Then, the Bureau of Immigration would have to allow him to enter the country.

The timing is critical, because Regala’s daughter Nadia is being recruited by Gilas Pilipinas national women’s team program director and head coach Pat Aquino. Aquino, who is in the thick of preparation for the FIBA Women’s Asia Cup which starts on Sept. 27 in Amnan, Jordan, has actually traveled twice to see the Regalas in Maryland.

“Nadia is a tremendous shooter,” Aquino says. “And she’s been playing against bigger, stronger players there. That has really helped her development.”

“I’ve always wanted to bring my family back to the country to show my kids where we come from,” Regala says wistfully. “And if Nadia gets to play for the national team, that would be awesome.”

When that time comes, a long-standing injustice will finally have been undone, and Eulo Regala and other players like him can give back to the country they have missed for so long