MANILA: Even as Malaysian authorities plan to have monthly deportations of illegal immigrants in Sabah, many deported Filipinos have already returned or plan to despite fear of being re-arrested.

The Philippine Daily Inquirer said many were deciding to return to Sabah to work despite the crackdown on illegal immigrants.

There may be as many as 500,000 illegal immigrants, including Indonesians, working in construction sites and oil palm plantations in Sabah.

The Philippine government estimates 200,000 Filipinos are in Malaysia without valid visas and nearly 3,000 are in detention camps waiting to be deported.

The southern Philippine port city of Zamboanga has received more than 1,000 deportees since the crackdown.
The Philippine Daily Inquirer said many of those deported see little future in the Philippines.

Basit Nur, 40, who worked as a carpenter in Sabah but was expelled after three months, said the risk of being re-arrested was better than the alternative of seeing his family mired in poverty in the southern Philippines.

"Even if I don't have the money for processing of my (travel) papers ... I will find other ways to return. And I will make sure that I will outsmart the police there," he said.

Carpenter Maximo Abduraid, deported from Sabah three weeks ago, has already slipped back into Sabah, his relatives said. -- AFP