SANDAKAN: State National Security Council has deported 400 undocumented immigrants in Sabah back to the Philippines this afternoon.
Its secretary Datuk Rodzi Md Saad said a ship, MV Lady Mary Joy 3, bound for Zamboanga City in Mindanao, was utilised to facilitate the large-scale deportation exercise.
The move was also seen as a way to prevent congestion at the state’s immigration detention facilities.
Rodzi said the group was supposed to leave last month but the ferry designated to deport them sank somewhere in the Philippines waters on Sept 22.
"These illegal immigrants, aged between one and 60-years-old, were placed at Sandakan temporary detention centre near here awaiting deportation proceedings.
"The repatriation shows the government's commitment in handling the presence of immigrants in the state," he said in a statement.
Last Thursday, during a bilateral meeting in Putrajaya, Malaysia and Philippines have agreed on gradual repatriarion of Filipinos in Sabah.