MURDOCH’S TRAVEL Officials complain

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33095, 9 December 1972, Page 1

MURDOCH’S TRAVEL Officials complain

(N.Z.P.A. Staff Correspondent) SINGAPORE, Dec. 8. Singapore immigration officials, after the All Black, K. Murdoch, had flown out of Singapore for Darwin last night, threatened an inquiry into how he was smuggled into the republic two days earlier. Officials at Singapore Airport complained to Qantas that Murdoch had not passed through immigration, customs, and health checkpoints on Tuesday evening when he left the plane taking him from London to Sydney. It appeared that Murdoch was given treatment similar to that he received at London Airport on Monday, when he evaded departure control points and was spirited straight on to the aircraft. Singapore authorities are particularly concerned that Murdoch did not pass through the health checkpoint, as his aircraft had made a transit stop in Bahrain, the suspected origin of a number of recent cholera cases. In London, the British Airports Authority has ordered an inquiry into the circum-

stances of• Murdoch’s departure. Meanwhile, Murdoch appears to have slipped through an elaborate nation-wide net of reporters waiting for him in Australia, according to an N.Z.P.A. message from Sydney. Murdoch, sent home from the All'Blacks touring party in Britain after incidents in a Cardiff hotel, was scheduled to arrive in Darwin early this morning on a Qantas flight from Singapore. But he did not disembark from the plane and could not be traced at the airport for an interview. The plane later flew to Port Moresby, where a press alert has once again been mounted. In Sydney checks were made on all three Singapore flights scheduled for today. Qantas officials in Singapore—who protected Murdoch while he lay low there for two days—confirmed that he left last night on a flight to Darwin. The officials said they assumed that Murdoch left the plane at Darwin this morning, as he. would have needed a special permit to fly to the final destination, Port Moresby. They said he did not have a permit. Officials at the New Zea-

- land High Commission in Singapore said that they were - "quite satisfied” that Muri doch had left on last night’s t flight. i An N.Z.P.A. correspondent i in Singapore watched Mur- - doch—who has shaved off his distinctive “Viva Zapata” i moustache—check in at the j counter for the flight. t Murdoch confirmed that he i was flying to Darwin when ; talking to the correspondents t but declined to say when he 1 would return to New Zea- > land. [ He later entered the air- . port departure lounge with a ground hostess from Singa- > pore Airlines, which handles ; Qantas traffic in Singapore. i The New Zealand Rugby • Union yesterday endorsed the > decision of the All Blacks’ manager (Mr E. L. Todd) to . send Murdoch back to New . Zealand. > The matter was discussed : at an in-camera meeting of ; the union’s council in Wellington, after which the Rugby Union’s chairman (Mr : J. L. Sullivan) issued the . brief statement: "As has al- | ready been stated, after consideration of Mr Todd’s tele- . phoned reports, the council ; endorsed the manager’s decision to return K. Murdoch . to New Zealand.”