Official extortion at airport

Official extortion at airport

From Koran Tempo

I have a bad experience with officials at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport. In November, my wife, a colleague and I returned from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. After our passports had been checked at the immigration section, we proceeded to collect our baggage. At that point, a male official asked my colleague to show his passport.

He was extremely rude when asking to see my colleague's passport. "Where's the passport?" he demanded, pointing at us. We got the impression he was interrogating us as he asked about our jobs. When our colleague showed him his (green) passport, the brusque official then pointed to my wife and rudely inquired, "This one? What's her job?"

Honestly, I was very really irritated by his attitude, but I was too tired to argue with him. Then, we realized that the plane that took us to Jakarta also carried a lot of Indonesian migrant workers returning from Malaysia. I've heard all the rumors that airport officials try to "get hold of" these migrant workers and made them objects of their extortion.

I may be wrong, but still the way the official acted was really disappointing. As far as I know, passports are to be checked only by immigration officers. The officials in charge of the baggage section has no right to check somebody's passport, let alone give us the third degree because they assume we could be exploited in some way.

Airport authorities have supposedly done away with scalpers and now it is time for them to ensure that their own officials learn how to behave professionally without corruption.

ARI A. PERDANA, Jakarta