DAVAO CITY – Smooth and fast.
These were two reactions given by Dabawenyos who availed of the two-day Passport on Wheels service of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and the Apo Production Unit Inc. of the Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) in Davao City on Friday and Saturday, March 16 and 17.
“Walay isa ka oras humana ang pag process sa application. Mas okay ni. Mas mayo (There’s not even one hour to process the application. This is okay. This is better,” Juliana Lomuljo of Lanang, Davao City.
Lomuljo availed the service for the renewal of her passport. She wanted the government to repeat the conduct of the passport on wheels service because it is difficult to find a slot for the online appointment.
This was also the same for 24-year-old Jesriel Dagohoy, who was a first timer passport applicant.
“The flow of the procedure was fast,” he said.
Dagohoy said the passport on wheels service was a good opportunity for the people to get passports.
“Dako gyud siya ug tabang (It’s really a big help,” he added.
Lomuljo and Dagohoy were among the 4,500 Dabawenyos who applied for new or the renewal of their passports through the Passport on Wheels service, which was requested by Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio for Davao City.
The processing was held at the Davao City Recreation Center. The city governemnt also offered free rice porridge.
The city government has seen the benefit it can bring to the people, thus wanted to hold it again in another time.
Michael Dalumpines, Chairman and CEO of Apo Production Unit, hopes to hold the same service in Davao.
He said it will now depend on the city government and the DFA when to bring the Passport on Wheels again.
He said Apo is ready to bring their equipment and teams again to Davao City for the same activity.
However, he said there is already a plan to increase the Passport on Wheels van to 10. Apo is already in the process of acquiring 6 vans with one bigger vehicle that can accommodate eight data capturing machines to be stationed in Davao City to serve other provinces in Mindanao.
It will be the DFA which will assign the vans in other areas if there are requests from local government units to serve their constituents.
Dalumpines said Apo can print 14,000 passports per day. Apo’s printing plant in Batangas can accommodate 24,000 to 26,000 passports per day.
Ricarte Abejuela, the director of the DFA Passport Division, said the passport on wheels was launched by DFA in partnership with Apo in January 12. It is a temporary consular office.
Abejuela said this was conceptualized to address the huge demand for passports. He said there is a huge gap between demand and capacity. The high demand is evidenced in the filling up of appointment slots by the thousands every day.
“We are facing constraints to address demand,” Abejuela said during a press conference at the Grand Men Seng Hotel Friday afternoon.
He said the passport on wheels in Davao City is DFA’s biggest in terms of the number of applicants. The biggest so far, was 1,800 in Zambales.
The general sentiment here (Davao City) was that they were happy and pleased and the processing was smooth, Abejuela said. Abejuela bared that DFA targets to process 4 million passports this year. In 2016, DFA issued 3.1 million passports and 3.6 million in 2017.
Abejuela said the increasing demand for passport was noted starting in 2012.
DFA receives an average 2,000 to 2,200 passport application every day. (Lilian C. Mellejor/PNA)
