Danilo De Leon, the chairperson of Migrante Canada, is set to be deported to the Philippines by the government of Canada. CPSO condemns these despicable actions carried out against him, as well as other undocumented workers, by the Canadian government.
In 2009, Danilo arrived in Edmonton, Alberta from the Philippines as a temporary foreign worker to work at Bee Clean, a cleaning company. His application to extend his open work permit was refused in February 2017 because his temporary resident status had already expired. With no legal immigration status, he faces deportation from Canada.
Danilo’s request has been denied, and although the Canadian government has deferred his deportation, this does little more than leave him in the same bureaucratic limbo many undocumented workers face. Now he must wait while the Canadian government conducts a sham risk assessment as if his years of work and service in Canada mean nothing.
Danilo has lived and worked in Canada for over ten years, pays his income taxes, gives back to his community through his volunteer work which included helping with the Edmonton Food Bank and the Edmonton General Hospital. Danilo considers Canada his home. As a father of two daughters, Danilo took the sacrifice of leaving them in the Philippines to work in Canada so he could provide for them. He has worked tirelessly and has persevered with the hope that his daughters could join him and they can be reunited as one family.
Danilo De Leon is also an outspoken migrants’ rights advocate and the Chairperson of Migrante Canada. Both Migrante Global and Migrante Alberta have been red-tagged by associates of the Philippine state which means his deportation can easily become a death sentence. State sanctioned killings of human rights activists are regularly carried out by the AFP under the guise the of war on drugs and the war on terror, which are funded by both the US and Canadian military.
The plight of undocumented workers such as Danilo is directly caused by neo-liberal policies of the reactionary government of the Republic of the Philippines, which directly supports the imperialism of western capitalists. Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW) remittances for 2016 alone account for around $27 billion, or around 10 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). They were made a formal and essential part of the economy of the Philippines in 1974, when then-Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos issued Presidential Decree 442 or the 1974 Labor Code. Feudal landownership, rapidly rising inflation and high unemployment drive many Filipinos abroad. This, combined with the comprador class deliberately keeping the Philippines underdeveloped and large multinational corporations extracting superprofits results in the Philippines depending on imports from western imperialist countries despite the natural abundance of the islands.
Danilo’s case is high profile, but is far too common among foreign workers – good enough to work, but not good enough to stay in the eyes of the government. This is why CPSO stands with Migrante Canada in demanding the regularization of all workers now!
What you can do:
- Share the Migrant Canada statement
- Email their MP
- Sign the petition!
- Donate to his legal fund: migrantealberta@gmail.com
#LetDaniloStay #RegularizeNow #RegularizationForAll