As commuters travelling through the Singapore-Malaysia land borders continue to be mad about the massive year-end congestion at checkpoints, sometimes they only have themselves to blame.
The Immigration & Checkpoints Authority (ICA) announced in a press conference today that they’re seeing an increasing amount of foreigners arriving in Singapore with invalid travel documents, TODAY reports.
Cases such as expired passports — or not even holding one — have gone up as compared to last year said ICA. In such cases, ICA officers have to take more time to verify the documents and establish their motives.
They’ll later be turned away and asked to obtain the right proper documents — wasting everyone’s time (and queue space) in the process. This would add to the already longer waiting time prompted by ICA’s heightened security checks at Woodlands and Tuas checkpoint following the attacks in Paris.
ICA’s new system of double barriers have also added to the waiting time at their checkpoints. Officers will check the arriving cars first before letting them in to the booths to get passports verified.
“Our land checkpoints are among the busiest land crossings in the world,” said Minister for Home Affairs K Shanmugam in response to the frustrating traffic jams. “People understand that, as a result of what has happened in Paris and the heightened terrorism threats worldwide, ensuring the safety of Singapore and Singaporeans is ICA’s foremost priority.”
