Tonga government proved that Taulava is also Filipino

Pauliasi Taulava

Paulasi Taulava's (206-C-73, college: BYU-Hawaii) team Talk n' Text urged Philippine Basketball Association Commissioner Noli Eala to immediately lift the league’s suspension on Paul Asi Taulava in light of documents from the government of Tonga confirming that Taulava is half-tongan and half-Filipino. 

The lawyer Ray Espi­nosa, spokesperson of Talk ‘N Text, said there is “no more doubt that Taulava is a Filipino as affirmed for the nth time” by the new documents he submitted to the National Bureau of Investigation yesterday.

Through his lawyer Eduardo Francisco, Taulava submitted to NBI Director Reynaldo Wycoco the following documents, certified on April 20 as true official documents of the government of Tonga by its Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Taulava’s birth certificate showing his mother Pauline to be a Filipino citizen at the time of his birth, The death certificate of Taulava’s grandmother, the former Ana Hernandez, showing she was a born Filipino and died a Filipino; and a certification that Pauline came to Tonga as a Filipino citizen and was naturalized on September 8, 1976, as a Tongan national, well after giving birth to Taulava in 1973.

“The PBA Commissioner’s Office, for a long time now, has unjustly denied Taulava his contractual rights to play for TNT, in effect denying him his basic human right to provide for his family,” said Espinosa.