By Olivia Miwil - April 1, 2022 @ 5:53pm
TAWAU: After two years, Sabah Immigration deported 237 Indonesian detainees to Nunukan port in Indonesia from here yesterday.
State department director SH Sitti Saleha Habib Yussof said the Indonesian citizens have been detained at the Tawau Immigration depot since 2020.
She said deportation exercises were delayed many times due to neighbouring countries refusing to accept detainees due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
"Sabah Immigration department and the Consulate General of the Republic of Indonesia in Tawau led by Consul Heni Hamidah have collaborated to implement the Repatriation Program for Illegal Immigrants (PATI) Series 1/2022.
"In terms of detainees management at the centres throughout the state, all have to go through strict health screening including Covid-19 tests and undergoing isolation for a certain period.
"This is to ensure that there will be no spread of Covid-19 infection among immigrants before the deportation," she said in a statement, adding most of them have also received vaccines and booster doses.
Sitti said all detainees had served their sentence after committing the offence under Immigration Act 1959/93 and Immigration Regulations 1963.
She also said 78 immigrants including one Indonesian, 42 Filipinos and 35 other nationalities were deported back to their country of origin via air this year.
As for the Filipinos, the department has referred a list of 2,000 names to the Philippine embassy in Kuala Lumpur for deportation to their country of origin.
"The deportation process for Filipino detainees has been long overdue since June 2021.
"The Philippine government through the Philippine Embassy in Kuala Lumpur has previously ruled that any detainee deported to the Philippines must undergo an RT-PCR screening test with a negative Covid-19 test result before the deportation process.
"The cost of this RT-PCR test is fully borne by the Philippine Government," she said, adding the embassy was still awaiting allocations.
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