ICA specialist has witnessed the lengths to which some smugglers will go

SINGAPORE — He seemed friendly — almost too friendly — and appeared to have nothing to hide, and encouraged officers to inspect his lorry, which was ostensibly carrying stationery.

As it turned out, the lorry was also carrying 500 cartons of contraband cigarettes among the pens and erasers. “At my instruction to open the suspected boxes, he simply shrugged and said the consignments were all the same,” said Immigration and Checkpoints Authority of Singapore (ICA) specialist Zainal Abidin Abd, 28. He added: “This helped me understand the extent that travellers might go to deceive officers into allowing entry.”

In his five years of service, Mr Zainal has seen travellers trying to smuggle exotic birds that were sedated and hidden inside jackets, contraband cigarettes hidden in various compartments of their vehicles, forged travel documents, and controlled drugs and meat products.

“We have to constantly remind ourselves that a terrorist can look just like any other traveller in their attempt to evade detection … while the majority of the travellers passing through our checkpoints are genuine, we cannot afford to take any chances,” said Mr Zainal.

Mr Zainal is one of the 192 Home Team officers awarded the Ministry of Home Affairs’ sponsorships this year, and he is currently pursuing a full-time degree in psychology at SIM University, which he said is very applicable to border security. Currently, in his first year of studies, Mr Zainal said: “I have learnt that our actions communicate more than our speech. Communication is through our body language as well as the words we speak. This allows us to understand the demands of the travellers and also sieve out the irregularities.” STACEY LIM