Eliminate illegal fees

Four corporate guests of mine arrived from Thailand on Oct. 18 at Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta International Airport, and the immigration officer in charge, for no apparent reason, denied them entry unless they paid US$100 each.

They were allowed to pass through immigration after they paid $40 each. My guests from Singapore had a similar experience some time ago.

Such treatment of foreign visitors to Indonesia obviously brings disgrace to the nation.

In fact, all visitors from member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are exempt from the visa-on- arrival policy, so the charges are definitely going into the pockets of the immigration officers. If 100 visitors arrive daily, they will pocket $1,000, or Rp 9.5 million, in a day and make cumulative monthly takings of $30,000, or Rp 285 million.

I would like to call upon public officials to stop making money through illegal fees and carry out an internal reorganization to show the world that we are, indeed, committed to making improvements in all areas.

HERBERT SUBUR P. SILITONGA
Jakarta