Minister of Law and Human Rights Supports Batam-Bintan-Singapore Bubble Travel Policy Supports Tourism Recovery

Minister of Law and Human Rights (Menkum HAM) Yasonna Hamonangan Laoly/PHOTO VIA ANTARA

JAKARTA - Minister of Law and Human Rights (Menkum HAM) Yasonna Hamonangan Laoly supports the policy of opening the door to domestic tourism through the Batam, Bintan, and Singapore travel bubble schemes to accelerate tourism and economic recovery.

"We all really want conditions to recover quickly. We hope this 'travel bubble' can accelerate the revival of tourism and the community's economy," said the Minister of Law and Human Rights in a written statement quoted by Antara, Monday, January 24.

Travel bubble is a travel corridor system that aims to divide participants into different groups (bubbles) by separating participants or someone who has a risk of being exposed to COVID-19.

Whether from contact history or history of traveling to areas where community transmission occurs with the general public accompanied by restrictions on interaction only to people in the same bubble and application of quarantine principles to reduce the risk of spreading COVID-19.

Yasonna hopes that the "travel bubble" policy can work well and can serve as an example if it will be implemented in other areas.

In addition, Yasonna ensured that the central government, regional governments, the COVID-19 Task Force, the TNI, and the National Police would conduct periodic evaluations.

"This travel bubble is very good as a pilot and the ranks of the Ministry of Law and Human Rights must work together for the implementation of immigration in the 'travel bubble' area," he said.

Moreover, he said, Indonesia would hold a big event, for example, the G20 Summit in Bali. Nevertheless, the evaluation of the policy must be carried out every week in between to determine whether this step can be continued or not.

As is known, the travel bubble began to open on January 24 with the government's consideration because Batam and Bintan are already at level 1 of the implementation of restrictions on community activities (PPKM).

The mechanism related to the Batam-Bintan-Singapore "Travel Bubble" is contained in the Circular of the Task Force (Satgas) for Handling COVID-19 which regulates the entrance of foreign travelers (PPLN).

The circular contains the conditions for traveling to Indonesia through the travel bubble scheme, which must be twice vaccinated, then negative for 3x24 hour PCR, have a visa, except for foreign citizens (WNA) Singapore who are part of ASEAN.

In addition, he has insurance holdings of 30,000 Singapore dollars and uses the PeduliLindungi and "BluePass" applications.