Patricia Fox asks DOJ: Reverse deportation order

Australian missionary Sister Patricia Fox is once again counting on the Department of Justice (DOJ) to overrule the Bureau of Immigration (BI) as she moved for the reversal of a deportation order against her.

Fox on Monday filed a petition asking the DOJ to review and set aside the BI directive that ordered her deportation and prohibited her re-entry to the Philippines for allegedly breaking the terms of her missionary visa.

The DOJ had earlier granted Fox a reprieve when it nullified the BI's forfeiture of her missionary visa.

Finding Fox an undesirable alien, the BI ordered her deported and blacklisted in July and affirmed its decision the following month, prompting the elevation of the case to the DOJ.

In her 39-page petition for review, Fox reiterated that the BI "prejudged" the case and based its decision on President Rodrigo Duterte's statement calling her an "undesirable alien." Duterte admitted he had ordered an investigation on Fox, 72, for "disorderly conduct."

The missionary's lawyers had raised this argument in her motion for reconsideration before the BI, but the bureau ruled that she raised no new arguments that warranted the modification of its earlier order.

Fox also said the BI failed to resolve the issue of whether the activities she allegedly committed are a valid exercise of her right to free speech and peaceful assembly.

"The alleged 'political activities' done by the petitioner are consistent with her congregation's charism and mission by which her missionary visa was granted to her in the first place," her petition read.

Fox has admitted that she has joined gatherings or assemblies of farmers, indigenous peoples and other oppressed groups where she has held banners that, among others, called for a stop to farmers' killings, but argued that "there is nothing wrong or illegal" with such activities.

"Joining or participating in activities that call for implementation of social justice and respect for human rights are part and parcel of her missionary work," her petition said.

"In contrast, sitting idly, keeping one's silence, doing nothing, when injustice and oppression [are] happening directly in one's eyes, is repugnant to the social doctrines and teaching of the church for salvation and liberation of the poor and powerless."

Fox also reiterated in her motion that the deportation order was "purely speculative" for being based on an intelligence agent's "unsubstantiated report."

Meanwhile, a purported dialogue between Fox and Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra did not materialize Monday afternoon due to short notice, according to the DOJ chief.

Guevarra said he saw Fox's request for a 1:30 p.m. meeting only past 3 p.m. "In view of the shortness of the notice, I will just reply to her in writing," he told reporters.

The religious worker's application for a tourist visa also did not push through. She is instead pursuing the renewal of her missionary visa, said Maria Sol Taule, one of her lawyers. —KBK, GMA News