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| Sunday, 24 November 2002 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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Immigration bottleneck at BIA With the beginning of the tourist season there is a rapid increase of passenger movements at Bandaranaike International Airport, Katunayake. Comparing to the past tourists from all over the world visit Sri Lanka due to prevailing peace in the country, with a heavy rush at the immigration counter, more on Saturdays and Mondays, in the morning hours. Departure terminal at BIA with eight immigration counters, whereas airlines have thirty nine (39) and a vast area for them. Normally there are about twenty five flight movements per day, out of which, around fifteen are during early hours. Five hours from 5 a.m. to 10 a.m., approximately 3,500 passengers are cleared at the counters. Space provided to immigration area is too small and not even fifty passengers can queue up there in front of the counter. All the passengers will have to go through this bottleneck and the area is sandwiched between the tax counters and the security area. No remedial action for this was ever taken, even after repeated requests. Total number of passenger traffic in 1991 was 1,286,989 and in the year 2000 number increased to 1,975,758 (by 688,769). Although the increase is over 50% the cadre of immigration officers at airport was cut down. In 1991 84 officers were attached but in 2000 it came down to 82. All the other institutions at the airport increased their cadres to cope with the developments but immigration counters remain the same. Facilities for immigration officers are also very poor. Up to last June, officers were rostered for 24 hours with two days off including Sundays on a gentleman's agreement between the officers and the department. Officers were happy as they save time in travelling. On a directive from the ministry, eight and sixteen hour shifts were introduced. With this new system only twenty officers can be rostered per shift but the earlier system provided twenty nine officers per shift. More time was wasted for change over with two shifts within 24 hours. For no reason ministry officials hesitate to revert to 24 hour shifts. The committee of Immigration and Emigration Dept. trade union is lucky to have a Minister and Controller Mervyn Wijesekare who are so considerate to give them a patient hearing. Minister John Amaratunga at a discussion with the Authorised Officers Union of the Department of Immigration and Emigration on October 22 agreed to recruit 25 new officers with immediate effect. With effect from November 22, Colombo-Tuticorin passenger shipping service will be in operation and at the same time arrangements are on the way to resume Talaimannar-Rameshwaram ferry service as well. At present officers at the prosecution unit Katunayake are released to work at the airport by the Controller to minimise the workload but it is hardly sufficient. |
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