The Department of Immigration and Emigration has been granted permission by the Supreme Court to recruit nearly 50 officers to carry out duties at the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA) in a bid to bring an end to a near five-week dispute which forced travellers to waste hours prior to their being cleared through immigration.
The Controller of Immigration and Emigration Mr. P. B. Abeykoon said, the department would recruit the officers based on the results of the open examination held in February this year. “We have held the examination and conducted the interviews as well, what is left is to get the permission of the Public Services Commission and go ahead with the recruitment. This will be completed within the next two weeks” he said.
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| P. B. Abeykoon |
The Department of Immigration and Emigration had been prevented from recruiting due to an on going Court case.
Around one hundred Enforcement Officers (EOs) filed action against the Department of Immigration and Emigration opposing the decision taken to recall the EOs from their posts. “We had to recall the 100 EOs due to a decision taken by the Cabinet.
One hundred graduates were recruited as EOs for a period of 2 years in 2005 acting on a Cabinet decision and in 2007 the contract period was extended up to 15 June 2008. The cabinet decided not to extend the period in 2008 and resultantly we had to recall them,” he said.
The disembarkation process of incoming passengers at the BIA was severely affected due to the shortage in staff caused by department’s decision to recall these officers.According to an officer working at the BIA some passengers had to wait in queues for over 2 hours to complete disembarkation procedures due to the shortage of staff. However the Department has taken steps to post more officers and the situation is improving,” he said.
Mr. Abeykoon said the department had taken steps to post 24 officers temporarily to ease the situation.
However, the department was prevented from recruiting officers to fill all its vacancies due to the on-going Court case. “We have had to close nearly 100 vacancies apart from the 46 positions which will be filled immediately. But Court ordered us to refrain from recruiting until a ruling is given on the issue of the graduate recruits,”Mr. Abeykoon said.
According to him steps will be taken to hold a fresh examinations before recruiting after the Court order on the matter is passed. | 
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