Immigration & Passport Matters

Kak Zura giving her briefing

After attending the Academic Coffee Session today, we stayed back awhile to join the discussion with the Malaysian Immigration Attache from Malaysian High Commission in Canberra, Miss Nor Azura Mohd Yusof. Turns out Kak Zura was an ex graduate of IIUM. The discussion focused on the issue of passport renewal & also getting a new passport for newborns.

It seems that the High Comm had finally agreed that if there's 5 students or more with a balance of 6 months or less in the life of their passport, they will be sending a representative to Melbourne to process the renewal for them. Plus they'll get a rebate along with the new passport. Rebate here refers to retaining the balance months left in the passport, provided they are 6 months or less. So if you have a balance of 3 months, your new passport will expire in 5 years & 3 months. But they will only entertain students.

As for making it easier for newborn's birth registration and passport issue, it is still pending because it also involves other departments besides the immigration. However, the newborn's parents could send the applications, get the forms witnessed & what not, when the High Comm's representative is in Melbourne, but when collecting the passport, the parents must still fly the baby in to Canberra to collect them.

Well, I think I got most of the gist right, hopefully something much better will come out of the discussion in the future.