MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) on Tuesday reported a passport renewal backlog of around three to four million due to mobility restrictions brought by the coronavirus pandemic.
DFA Undersecretary Brigido Dulay said that DFA offices had to temporarily shut down its operations as several areas in the country were placed under strict quarantine classifications, thus affecting their passport services.
“We admit, your honor, that there is a current backlog of around three to four million for passport renewals. And this really stems from the pandemic which has limited our ability to provide the usual, regular services and passport renewals to a lot of Filipinos,” Dulay said during the deliberations of the DFA budget for 2022.
Dulay said Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. has already already ordered the establishment of additional temporary offsite passport services sites to address the backlog.
“Tinataya namin na kakailanganin natin ng (We may need) additional 10 to 20 temporary offsite passport services just to try and minimize the backlog,” Dulay said.
“We have included actually in our Tier 2 [budget] proposal… sapagkat ‘yung aming ginawa ngayon ay hinango lang namin ‘yung budget noon, doon sa aming existing budget, at kinakapos na po kami,” he added.
(What we’re doing now is just adapted from our previous budget, our existing budget, and we still fell short.)
The DFA has a proposed budget of P21.051 billion for next year.