The older Beh, who was at the Penang International Airport today to greet his son, told FMT that the family does not want any media attention, for it would muddy their reputation further.
After being told that he had nothing to worry about as Chew Boo had been found not guilty by the Court of Appeal, the apex court in Singapore, and was therefore an innocent man, Ah Ba opened up a little.
“We are kampung people. Within our community, our doors are all open. People are free to walk in and out. There is no privacy. Once this kind of bad news comes, they gossip and might say bad things. I am worried,” he said.
He said that despite being acquitted, Chew Boo’s more-than-four-year prison term would be fodder for chatter.
Ah Ba, who has been a fisherman for the past 60 years and has been rearing cockles for the past decade at a farm near Nibong Tebal, said Chew Boo, like him, had little education.
Chew Boo dropped out of school in Form One and tried to earn a living on his own. His father said he was a respectful lad, who cared for his parents and his three siblings and was a hardworking and a good-hearted person.
Ah Ba said he last saw Chew Boo, his second son, about five years ago when he left for Johor to look for a job.
He said he was thankful to the Singaporean judiciary and prison system, saying they were very kind people.
“I got to speak to my son every month for 30 minutes. And the High Court allowed him to take a three-day Chinese New Year break recently,” he said.
Chew Boo arrived at the Penang International Airport at about 9.15am from Singapore, with 11 other passengers on board a Scoot airline aircraft.
He only emerged into the public area about two hours later at 11.30am, as he had to undergo a Covid-19 test. Ah Ba and his sister Siew Yee could not contain their excitement as they met and tried to hug him. They were quickly stopped by Civil Defence officers who said no one could come close. They handed a Malaysian SIM card and some pocket money to Chew Boo who will now go into quarantine for at least 10 days.
Asked how he felt upon landing, Chew Boo said: “I am happy to be back home.” He is being quarantined at the Rainbow Paradise Hotel in Tanjung Bungah, one of the few government-mandated quarantine stations in the state for foreign arrivals.
Chew Boo, who was caught with drugs which were found under the seat of a motorcycle he had borrowed from a friend in 2016, had been sentenced to death in Singapore. He escaped the gallows after a Singapore Court of Appeal acquitted him of drug trafficking charges last year. He spent 53 months in prison.
His lawyer Wong Siew Hong said Chew Boo’s case was easily the first in Singapore where someone sentenced to death for trafficking drugs was acquitted on appeal.