SINGAPORE: When Nur Joanna Zulkepeli learnt that her prison release date had been pushed back by close to two months, she was secretly “quite happy”.
“Because if (it’s) deferred, I get to stay here and see my mum,” she said.
Joanna, 22, and her mother, Juliana Baba, 52, are both inmates in Singapore’s only women’s prison, serving time in different cells for separate drug offences.
But as with other inmates, who can receive two visits a month from loved ones, they are only permitted a 30-minute teleconference and a 20-minute face-to-face session, or two 30-minute teleconferences.
They are not allowed to touch each other, not even during special occasions like one that CNA witnessed.
“Happy birthday, Mummy! Happy birthday to you,” Joanna sang as she passed her mother a hand-drawn card while seated across from her.
