Over the past two days, many Facebook accounts have shared a post dated January 2 by an account named Kugan Pillai, from Singapore. According to the post on his personal Facebook page, Kugan Pillai had just taken a flight from Hanoi to Singapore on January 2. When passing through the Noi Bai airport border gate to complete exit procedures, a security officer left a handwritten message on his plane ticket that read: "tip". At that time, the exit officer was holding Kugan Pillai's passport. This passenger asked the border security officer "for what?" but "he kept pointing to what he wrote".
"I didn't know what to do or who to ask for help and I was also rushing to prepare for my flight. In the end, I gave in to him by giving him 500,000 VND. I know this may be normal in such countries but I felt that I could have been arrested again, as if I didn't give the money, my passport would not be accepted," Kugan Pillai shared on the post. Notably, Kugan Pillai said that he had informed the Singapore Ministry of Foreign Affairs about the incident.
Less than 2 days after being posted, the article received nearly 8,000 shares, more than 10,000 likes, along with hundreds of comments sharing similar experiences at several other airports in Vietnam.
Contacting Noi Bai International Airport, the representative of this unit said that they were aware of the incident. However, all procedures related to the security check of the immigration area are the responsibility of the Immigration Management force (under the Ministry of Public Security), the Airport has no right to intervene, so Noi Bai Airport has transferred the information to the direct management agency to receive and handle.
The leader of the Immigration Department said that the unit has temporarily suspended the relevant Noi Bai border gate officer to verify and clarify the information about the accusation of asking for tips. According to this unit, the above move took place after the Immigration Department received a report from the Noi Bai border gate police. Immediately after that, this agency issued strong instructions to verify, clarify, and strictly handle according to the regulations of the industry and the law.
Regarding the report of the recently suspended police officer, a representative of the Immigration Department said that the incident is still under verification and therefore no further information has been provided. However, the leader of the Immigration Department pledged to strictly handle the officer if there is any violation.
Negativity at the airport - not a new problem
Below Kugan Pillai's post, there were many comments recounting similar situations where customs "ripped off" them.
Mai Phuong (25 years old), an international student, shared: "I have been studying in Japan for more than 5 years, have returned home twice, and have encountered difficulties from customs. The first time I returned, I was instructed to put some money in my passport to make things go smoother. I did so, but because I only put a few coins (1 USD), a customs officer told me to go to the back of the line. After that, I put 5 USD and everything went smoothly."
It can be seen that the negative situation at the airport is a problem that has existed for a long time but there is still no solution. (Illustration image)
Another group of people who are often "extorted" by customs is overseas Vietnamese. Mr. Tran Minh (45 years old), a Vietnamese living in the US, shared with Travellive: "Like all Vietnamese people abroad, I have a habit of giving many gifts to relatives. That is the reason why I was asked for a tip by customs. I declared on the declaration of goods brought into Vietnam a pair of speakers and an amplifier worth less than 300 USD. The customs officer told me to pay the tax, and opened a thick book with thousands of words inside, flipping back and forth to find which page specified the tax rate for my goods. He fumbled around for about 5 minutes, and after a moment of thinking, I knew what he wanted. I put a 20 USD bill in the middle of the book, then he sat down and said: "Okay, go." This was like he had just forgiven a bad person. I gave him the money because the flight was delayed by nearly 2 hours and my relatives were waiting outside. When I returned to the US, every time I thought about it, I felt sad about why in Vietnam there was such a situation. like this for a long time, and no one knows when it will end."
It can be seen that the negative situation at the airport is a problem that has existed for a long time, but there are still no strong enough measures, sanctions, or recommendations to limit these harassments.
