Worldwide with Wee-Cheng #10: Rejected from Bolivia � Happy Valentine\’s Day

#9: Rejected from Bolivia – Happy Valentine’s Day

14 Feb 2002
I rang the Bolivian Consulate in Santiago yesterday and spoke to a different official. He announced the verdict in a typically bureaucratic manner: “According to the fax from the Department de Migracions, Ministry of Exterior Affairs dated 21 January 2002, your visa application has been rejected. You are free to put forward another application.”

What a farce! No reasons given for the rejection of my visa application. I had submitted all the documents to the Bolivian Consulate in London in November – bank statements, status proof, air ticket, etc. They had told me it would take 5 to 8 weeks to process. When I reached Santiago in mid-January, they told me they had no news about it. I continued to ring them from a number of locations in Chile, including at least 2 phone calls that were made after 21 January 2002, and all I was told was that they were still waiting for the approval. And now after 12 or 13 weeks, they told me about the rejection, with no reasons given!

This is also ridiculous because Singapore (GDP per capita: $25,000) allows Bolivians visa-free entry into Singapore. Singaporeans can enter the United States and the European Union, as well as most developed and developing countries – without a visa. Yet Bolivia (GDP per capita: $1,000), one of the poorest countries in the world, imposes onerous visa conditions on Singaporeans, and even if such conditions are fulfilled, visa applications are often rejected. I am not the only Singaporean suffering from this. I have heard of quite a few others before me whose visas were denied by Bolivia.

Well, if they don’t want my money, I will bring it to other countries.

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