Tapah villagers feed migrant escapees while waiting for cops

Residents of Kampung Batu Melintang in Tapah, Perak, provided food and drinks to two detainees who escaped from the Bidor Temporary Immigration Depot before the migrants were detained by the police.

One resident, Razali Talib, 69, a retired teacher, said when the two detainees, believed to be in their teens, were apprehended by the congregation of Masjid Jamek Ar Rahmaniah Batu Melintang, he offered them drinks out of pity for their situation.

“They didn’t ask for food but some people felt sorry for them, so they donated two packets of ‘mee goreng’.

“But one of them, the Rohingya one, didn’t want fried noodles, he wanted instant noodles instead. However, the Bangladeshi guy probably was hungry because he finished one and a half packets of mee goreng,” he said to reporters today.

Razali, who is also the mosque’s imam, said he saw them inside the mosque when he was about to perform the ‘sunat’ prayer before dawn.

After the ‘sunat’ prayer, Razali enquired about the detainees’ origins but found their responses unsatisfactory.

“One claimed, ‘I am from Bangladesh’, but I doubted it because his facial features resembled Rohingya. As people were preparing for the dawn prayers, we proceeded, and they joined in. I left them undisturbed for a while,” he recounted.

Following the dawn prayer, Razali promptly requested his friend, retired police officer Mohd Isa Ariffin, 70, to contact the police and report the situation.

While waiting for the police to arrive, Razali instructed the mosque’s caretaker to observe the detainees’ movements while engaging them in conversation.

“While one couldn’t converse in Malay, another mentioned working in this area, claiming to be from Myanmar. I urged them not to fabricate stories since there have been no Myanmar or Bangladeshis working here,” he added, noting the detainees were casually dressed but without shoes.

Razali said the police arrived at the mosque to investigate and confirmed the individuals were indeed among the detainees who escaped from the detention centre. Subsequently, they were taken to the Ipoh district police headquarters.

According to Razali, villagers had been vigilant, particularly after the village chief alerted residents about the recent incident involving undocumented migrants fleeing from the detention centre.

“This area is known for its population of retired police personnel. They regularly update the community on matters of village security and legal concerns,” he remarked.

In the Thursday night incident, 131 undocumented migrants escaped from the male block of the detention centre, after which one of them lost their life in a road accident.

Out of the 131, 115 were Rohingya, 15 were Myanmar nationals, and one was a Bangladeshi.

Earlier, Immigration director-general Ruslin Jusoh verified that 10 of the escapees were apprehended as of this morning.

- Bernama

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