Letter to Editor
MISPLACED priorities mean focusing time, energy, or money on less important things while ignoring what is critical.
This seems to be the crux of the matter surrounding the recent passport cover fiasco at the Immigration Department’s UTC (Pudu Sentral) branch. A couple alleged they were treated like common criminals after being accused of filching a passport cover.
Apparently, a simple procedure to apply for a passport on Aug 21 turned into an ugly shouting match in which the lady and her spouse were allegedly accused of theft.
With the Immigration authorities currently in the spotlight for other less-than-positive news, it did not take long for social media to seize upon this incident to further paint the government department in a bad light.
The Immigration bosses reacted swiftly by lodging a police report over supposed factual inaccuracies. Apparently, there are substantial discrepancies between the complainant’s viralled grouses and CCTV footage.
There’s a lot of hearsay and conjecture over the entire episode with the official statement from the Immigration authorities shedding little light on what happened.
However, suffice to note that the disagreement was over the alleged misappropriation of a passport cover which is sold separately from the all-important travel document itself.
Just an accessory
The lady claimed she had unknowingly taken the cover while the immigration personnel are contending otherwise. Let’s avoid the tricky subject of who’s actually telling fibs here and focus on another detail that I find somewhat interesting.
In the first place, these passport covers are NOT official paraphernalia. The passport cover sold at Malaysian Immigration counters is completely optional and not standard issue.
It is an extra accessory hence purchasing it is entirely up to the customer. It is not an official requirement or a mandatory fee for travel documents.
More likely than not, funds collected from optional passport covers sold at Immigration Department counters (such as those noted in similar UTC branch procedures) are typically channelled into internal welfare funds – eg the respective branch’s Sports and Charity Club account – to support staff activities and welfare programmes.
Nothing wrong with that, right?
Until an incident like this explodes and uncomfortable questions are asked. Are immigration personnel focused on carrying out their tasks or are they more concerned about raising funds for their departmental activities?
A quick scroll on the Immigration Department’s social media confirms that many citizens feel the same with some calling for an outright ban of this practice.
The sense that this particular branch of the executive was not doing its job is apparent as many citizens see the presence of illegal aliens everywhere as ample proof.
Allegations of strongly-connected cartels bypassing immigration checkpoints at airports have also fuelled public anger.
Let’s be clear. Public perception of the civil service due to reasons above is not exactly sterling.
Publicity like this do NOT help matters regardless of whether the immigration staff were at fault this time. It feeds into the perception that these uniformed bodies are more concerned with pushing plastic passport adornments than serving the rakyat in a meaningful manner.
Forget who is wrong or right in this viralled incident. The CCTV footage should make things clearer, unless of course, it mysteriously goes missing.
The pertinent point is that Immigration counters are for processing official travel documents – not as points-of-sale for knick-knacks to support departmental leisure activities.
If such practices are not banned, the civil service remain open to ridicule and accusations of bureaucratic inefficiency and ineffectiveness will be its calling card. – Aug 26, 2026
Unimpressed Malaysian
Sepang, Selangor
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
Main image cover: Sample of Malaysian passport covers available on the Shopee e-commerce platform
