By Jeannette Chong-Aruldoss
I read with disquiet and appall the account by Charlotte Bellis, a pregnant New Zealand citizen who had been unable to return to her home country.
Her plight is far from unique. Due to the controversial “Managed Isolation and Quarantine” (MIQ) system, tens of thousands of NZ citizens have been unable to get home.
The MIQ system was implemented by the NZ Government in defence of the covid pandemic. Under the MIQ system, anyone entering New Zealand is required to isolate at an MIQ facility for 10 days. NZ citizens must book and secure MIQ facilities as a pre-condition to get back into their country.
Unfortunately, the number of NZ citizens wanting to return home far exceeds the very limited quantum of isolation facilities available for booking under the MIQ system. Charlotte Bellis was among the huge numbers of NZ citizens locked out of their own country by their own Government’s hand. I can only imagine the anxiety, frustration, despair and hardships that the stringent MIQ system has imposed on NZ citizens.
Unwanted separation from home and loved ones has become a worldwide symptom of the covid pandemic which has seen all countries barricading their doors, some more tightly than others. It is harsh when countries close the door on non-citizens. But things become eerily strange when a country locks out its citizens along with the foreigners.
Hearing about the desperation of NZ citizens who cannot get home, it struck me that being able to return to one’s own home country must surely be a given – a “needless to say” expectation – for any citizen. I don’t know much about NZ’s bill of rights, so I have no comment as to whether or how NZ’s MIQ system squares with their civil rights laws.
More pertinently, does our Singapore Constitution have anything to say about that?
I dived into the Singapore Constitution and fished out this clause, to my relief:
Section 13(1) of the Singapore Constitution states: “No citizen of Singapore shall be banished or excluded from Singapore.”
I am relieved because (unlike some other clauses in the Singapore Constitution relating to civil liberties), this particular clause has no “ifs” and no “buts”. I love it when a statement of a citizen’s right is simple and unequivocal.
As a mother of a son studying overseas, I distinctly recall the panic in March 2020 when I scrambled and managed to put my son on an SQ flight back to Singapore as the pandemic took the helm. At that time, plane loads of Singaporeans flew home to hunker down with their family and loved ones. Having each other made the ensuing lockdown days bearable and meaningful.
The unwelcomed pandemic has been overstaying for two years now. We have had to put up with much constraints to our movements. As for travelling, that has become a complicated affair with rules shifting and changing constantly. But Singaporeans who wanted to, have always been able to get home. And so it should be.
Some years ago, I was in plane landing in a foreign country. As the plane touched down, some passengers broke out in a spontaneous applause. Let me clarify that the landing was nothing unusual. The plane ride was not bumpy or scary, so the applause couldn’t be expressing relief for landing safely.
Curious, I asked a local why passengers clapped when the plane touched the tarmac. The local explained that it was the custom for his nationals to applause when their plane touched down, to express their happiness at coming home. I immediately understood. We all love to travel. And – needless to say – we also love to come back to home.
Postscript: On 3 February 2022, the NZ Government announced that from 28 February 2022, NZ would be reopening their border and that the MIQ system, which had been in place since April 2020, would end for all but “high-risk” unvaccinated travellers.
Jeannette Chong-Aruldoss is a lawyer practising in Singapore for more than 30 years.
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