SBMA to fine shipping agency for quarantine violation

SBMA to fine shipping agency for quarantine violation
Ruben Veloria March 4, 2021 https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1132595

SUBIC BAY FREEPORT – The Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) will penalize a shipping agency in Olongapo City after its seaman violated safety protocols at a quarantine hotel here.

SBMA chairman and administrator Wilma T. Eisma said on Thursday that Thyverse Marine and Shipping Agency, which is an accredited operator in the Freeport, committed negligence in controlling its off-signer identified as Zaw Oo, a crewman who disembarked in Subic from the cargo ship M/V Voyager Elite.

“There are rules for everyone’s safety, and we will see to it that they are obeyed,” Eisma said in a statement.

“We cannot tolerate any violation of health and safety protocols because our mandate is to ensure that all stakeholders in the Subic Bay Freeport adhere to the rules laid down by the IATF (Inter-Agency Task Force),” she added.

Off-signers (disembarking crew) are required to take a reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test upon arrival in Subic, then go to a quarantine hotel where they are supposed to stay inside their rooms all the time, and take another confirmatory RT-PCR test five days later before they can be cleared by Bureau of Quarantine for release to their final destination.

While quarantined at Horizon Hotel here on Feb. 25, Zaw did not leave the hotel premises.

However, he reportedly went out of his room several times, even argued with hotel staff and sometimes appeared intoxicated.

In a letter dated Feb. 28, Lt. Napoleon Veneracion II, commander of the IATF Crew Change One-Stop-Shop in Subic, told Thyverse president Jason Lacbain that a review of closed circuit television camera footage in the hotel indicated “that the said off-signer went out of his room several times.”

Veneracion added that Zaw Oo’s quarantine period has been set back to day one effective Feb. 28 because of the violation.

Under the rules set by the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases, violation of health and safety protocols carries a PHP5,000 fine.

Eisma said she has instructed concerned SBMA departments to prepare the notice of violation and bill Thyverse Marine for the infraction.

The Subic Bay Freeport has served as crew-change hub since September last year in order to help ease the current congestion in Manila Bay where merchant ships with Filipino crewmen await their turn to disembark their crew and take in fresh personnel.

Under this setup, inbound seafarers are quarantined in local hotels after their RT-PCR test. (PNA)