Wednesday, May 07, 2008

Letter to fly

A recent article in the newspaper informed that there will be a new regulation stating that women who are traveling alone should carry a letter stating reason for travel. This is due to the high level of cases where women were conned into being mules for drug trafficking. To date there are 119 of our nationals being held in prison abroad for possession of drugs. The usual penalty : Death

There were disputes from women politicians stating that this regulation was “backwards” and does not promote independence for women.

My take is that, if we were so “forward” then why are our women continuously being duped into carrying drugs? Given that they were unaware of the smart tactics of these conmen, and “it could have to you” reasons, I believe we have always been warned not to accept luggage, parcels etc from strangers when we travel. Infact, some airports even make announcements towards this awareness.

In my opinion, this new regulation could only serve for the betterment rather than otherwise. It seeks to protect our (gullible?) women from people who take advantage of it.

Now, how do we weigh the pros and cons of this? Being “backwards” vs a death sentence.

Something to ponder isn’t it.

1 comment:

Matt Marzuki said...

More bureaucracy and paperwork! What good will this do as drug traffickers would be equipped with such letters by their minders anyway, so the whole thing is pointless.

What needs to be done is to continue educating the public on the risks of drug trafficking and to provide awareness about these syndicates' existence. If the message doesn't get through, review the method of communication, not by pushing the problem back to the public, as always.