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Tourism Officials See Red Over Scrapping of 7-Day Visas
January 28, 2010

Visitors getting a Visa on Arrival will have to pay for a 30-day stay. (Antara Photo) Visitors getting a Visa on Arrival will have to pay for a 30-day stay. (Antara Photo)
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Simon P
1:58pm Feb 1, 2010

I must have read hundreds of stories like this over the years here. Govt. employees or members of the police or military massively abuse their position through corruption or even actually murdering people and the only punitive action taken is a wage increase freeze or a promotion freeze. It's quite bizarre.


BenJakarta
1:13pm Feb 1, 2010

"The ministry discovered that officials had been defrauding travelers by issuing $10 visas to those who paid $25 and pocketing the difference. Maroloan said officers in charge were punished by having their pay rises frozen."

Why would you not sentence those people to lengthy prison terms on multiple counts of fraud? And have them making license plates for years to earn enough money at 500 Rupiah/hour to *pay restitution* to those tourists they scammed? Like any Western country?

"You stole from dozens of the nation's customers? OK, no *extra* money for you...temporarily...so you get the *message*!"

Because they are Licensed To Steal - truly. The Wage Hike Freeze legal response is truly comical, a gem from 2010, a time when Indonesia is still in its Wild West days. We'll be telling our wide-eyed grandchildren, "yep, they'd even print it in the newspaper!" Teary-eyed friends at bars will say, laughing, "tell 'em the one about the Balinese Wage Freeze again!"

In defense of immigration on another issue, elapsed times thru Soekarno-Hatta immigration are a fraction of what they are at Heathrow or Los Angeles.

"Balinese Wage Freeze" -you can't make this stuff up - unbelievable.

marceldeb
1:24pm Jan 28, 2010

Maroloan should leave the managment of tourist arrivals to the ministry of tourism and culture. No tourist who has planned for a only short stay would be tempted to stay for longer as he or she will not have prepared to do so.


peterR
12:08pm Jan 28, 2010

I get so frustrated by what goes on. I simply cannot imagine what it must by like to be in an Indonesian's shoes reading through the daily antics of their leaders and administrators. Each day that goes by the stories just get more and more ludicrous. Were I Indonesian, I can only imagine that I would be in jail for inciting revolution or punching someone's lights out, or worse.

The country is run by brain-dead chimps, liars and thieves.

papaD
9:37am Jan 28, 2010

"Maroloan said officers in charge were punished by having their pay rises frozen"

That's a punishment? why can't they just put a law that says Termination is mandatory for any public official caught red handed for corruption.


Two government departments look set for a clash of ideas over the scrapping on Tuesday of seven-day visas on arrival for foreigners arriving in Indonesia.

Scrapping the $10 visas and leaving only the $25 visas, which is valid for 30 days, will encourage foreign tourists to stay longer as well as curb graft among immigration officials, Maroloan Barimbing, the spokesman for the Directorate General of Immigration under the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights, said on Wednesday.

Maroloan said visitors must now buy the 30-day visa regardless of how long they plan to stay. As a bonus, they will now be able to extend the visa by another 30 days without leaving the country, immigration officials have said.

But scrapping the seven-day option has proved immediately controversial, with the Culture and Tourism Ministry taking the unusual step of publicly  denouncing it as likely to actually reduce tourist arrivals.

“I am worried the regulation would affect foreign tourists who make frequent short stays,” Firmansyah Hakim, the ministry’s director general of tourism destination development, told the Jakarta Globe Wednesday.

He said his ministry was currently reviewing the potential impact on tourist numbers. “We are going to ask the immigration department to sit down with us and hopefully we can come up with a solution,” he said.

Industry experts have said the global economic crisis has shifted many tourists from long stays to shorter visits. In 2009, tourists stayed an average of 8.58 days, continuing a trend toward shorter stays since 2000, the Tourism Ministry reported. The low figure demonstrates that a significant number of visitors — especially those arriving by land from Malaysia and Singapore at Batam in Riau Islands province — come for stays of less than seven days and will now have to pay extra.

“Visitors from immediate border countries will likely think twice before going for a short trip in our country,” Firmansyah said.
Maroloan defended the move, saying visitors planning only short stays would be tempted to stay for longer as they would automatically have a 30-day visa.

“We hope this policy will extend tourists’ stays in Indonesia, giving them a chance to visit more places in the country,” he said.
“The policy will also simplify the supervision of overstaying foreign tourists because there is only one visa option.”

He said the decision was also meant to combat corruption. Last year, the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) caught the ministry off guard by revealing it had found more than Rp 3 billion ($321,000) in unreported fees for visas on arrival collected over a six-month period at Ngurah Rai International Airport in Denpasar, Bali.

The ministry discovered that officials had been defrauding travelers by issuing $10 visas to those who paid $25 and pocketing the difference. Maroloan said officers in charge were punished by having their pay rises frozen.

The ministry conducted a similar inspection at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Jakarta but the spokesman said no irregularities were found.

The immigration department was listed as one of the country's most corrupt public institutions in a 2009 bribery index survey released by Transparency International Indonesia.