DFA offers free passport validity extension amid delays

The Department of Foreign Affairs is offering a free passport validity extension for up to two years for passport renewal applicants in the Philippines and abroad.

The DFA came up with the offer after experiencing “unexpected delays” in the processing of passport renewals.

“The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) offers to applicants for passport renewals in the Philippines and abroad the extension of the validity of their passports (for 1 to 2 years, which is free of charge,” the DFA said in its advisory.

“Extensions shall be processed and released within the same day. Passport extensions for all shall be available only until the end of this year,” the department added.

The DFA has been reportedly delayed in issuing up to 42,230 passports.

Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario attributed the delays to “technical difficulties” as the government prepares to transfer its passport facilities.

Del Rosario said the delays “should be corrected within one month.”

The government earlier promised to improve the system of processing passports with the transfer of production to APO Production Unit Inc, which is reportedly able to produce 20,000 passports a day.

Akbayan party-list Representative Ibarra Gutierrez, however, said the P8 billion 10-year contract the DFA entered into with APO was questionable.

Gutierrez said he will file a resolution in Congress to probe the contract “in aid of legislation.”

“We expect the DFA to explain and clarify its intentions and fully explain the reasons behind its decision to transfer the printing of the country’s passports from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to the APOProduction,” Gutierrez earlier said.

Gutierrez insisted that the security plant of the BSP is the only government-owned printing facility that has the capability and the necessary security features required in producing such vital travel documents.

“Why did the DFA suddenly agree to transfer the production of the country’s passports to the APO Production Unit, a private firm that has no established track record for printing security documents?” he said.

A private company, APO has taken on the status of a “quasi-government body” after it was placed under the Presidential Communications Operations Office.

Its employees, however, continue to be members of the Social Security System and its adoption under the PCOO was essentially for the purpose of supporting the printing of the government’s information and propaganda materials.

Foreign Affairs spokesman Charles Jose, for his part, defended the contract.

“I don’t think we would have entered into it if it were not aboveboard,” Jose said.