Immigration DG pledges to assist investigations into berating incident at KLIA

SEPANG: The Immigration Department will give its full cooperation to the special committee investigating a high-ranking government official for allegedly berating one of its officers in public.

Department director-general Datuk Seri Khairul Dzaimee Daud said he would reserve comment for now since a special committee has been tasked with conducting a probe into the matter.

“What I can say is that we will fully cooperate with the committee in its probe,” he told reporters after an engagement session with tour agencies at Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) yesterday.

On Sunday, Chief Secretary to the Government Tan Sri Mohd Zuki Ali announced the formation of the committee, chaired by Attorney- General Tan Sri Idrus Harun.

Also in the committee are Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Acryl Sani Abdullah Sani, Auditor-General Datuk Seri Nik Azman Nik Abdul Majid and Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission chief commissioner Tan Sri Azam Baki.

The outcomes and recommendations of the investigation will be presented to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob for further consideration, Zuki said.

During the incident on Aug 3, the Immigration operations head at KLIA was said to be at the receiving end of the rebuke when apparently no Immigration officers were stationed at the VIP lane between 8.40am and 9.40am.

The next day, the Public Service Department (PSD) refuted claims of its director-general having publicly castigated the Immigration official, saying that the charges against the former were baseless and intended to tarnish his image as a high government official.

In its statement, PSD said the director-general had reprimanded the official for not complying with practices and procedures when the officers failed to check his delegation members’ travel documents and passports but directed them to the Customs inspection counter to continue their journey.

Following that, the Malaysian Immigration Authorities Associa-tion and the Peninsular Malaysia Immigration Service Union released statements criticising the incident, with alleged accounts of it making the rounds on social media.

Meanwhile, on an unrelated matter, Khairul Dzaimee denied claims of discrimination against foreigners entering the country.

This follows a video which was circulated on TikTok alleging that Indian tourists were being ill-treated at Malaysian airports.

The short video claimed that Indian nationals were made to wait unnecessarily even though they had all their documents and proofs of having sufficient funds.

It also claimed that Indian nationals were made to sit on the floor, describing it as a sign of disrespect.“We always offer the best service to foreigners and tourists entering our country,” said Khairul Dzaimee.

He, however, noted that there were incidents where foreigners spent hours loitering at the airport instead of heading straight to the Immigration counters.

“There were even incidents of foreigners attempting to hide from the authorities in toilets at the airport,” he added.

Khairul Dzaimee explained that his officials would know the number of passengers disembarking from the aircraft through the flight manifest.

“So when some of the foreigners on these manifests don’t show up at the Immigration counters, we send enforcement officers to round them up. They are then taken to the operations office for questioning.

“We had uncovered visitors who came here not as tourists but to find work,” he said, adding that some of them did not have adequate funds or a place to stay.

These visitors, he added, violated their social visit pass and were issued a not-to-land order (NTL) and sent back to their country of origin.He said that since January, 34,786 foreigners had been issued NTL orders, of which 4,207 were at KLIA.

“Most of these foreigners were from Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Nepal and Vietnam,” he said.