The Bahamas government’s unwavering commitment to protect the Bahamian borders and enforce the lawful processes for entry into The Bahamas

Any and all unlawful entrants in Bahamian territory will be swiftly processed and repatriated to their homeland

NASSAU, The Bahamas -- The Hon. Keith Bell, Minister of Labour and Immigration told members of the House of Assembly while delivering a communication Wednesday, February 1, 2023 about the government’s unwavering commitment to protect our borders and enforce the lawful processes for entry into The Bahamas.  

During my last communication, he said - “I stated that I know and fully accept that we will be measured by our work, our results and not our speeches.  I further stated that The Department of Immigration is committed to doing the work needed to deliver the results that the Bahamian people demand.

"Our work to address this pressing issue did not commence with my communication," he said, "nor did it commence with the many false articles and stories authored by fringe groupings, this work began ‘ON DAY ONE.’

Within months of coming to office, this administration, led by the Hon. Philip Brave Davis Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, uplifted the spirits of a demoralized and broken Immigration Department by immediately remedying the longstanding confirmations and promotions of officers in various ranks which were left outstanding by the former administration from as far back as 2014. 

“I might add, this directly impacted more than 250 Immigration Officers or more than 30% of the human resource of the Department.”

Minister Bell continued that the administration immediately recruited and commissioned the largest immigration squad in the history of the Department, “increasing the total number of immigration officers by over 30%.  THIRTY PERCENT.”

He noted: The Progressive Liberal Party government also made ‘the single largest investment in the history of the Royal Bahamas Defence Force’ with an injection of over $200M to upgrade the Defence Force through the 'Sandy Bottom Project':  "We bought a whole new fleet of vessels including HMBS Lawrence Major, the first ‘roll on, roll off’ vessel of its class acquired by the organization.

“In anticipation of present circumstances,” Minister Bell said, “we established a temporary holding facility in Inagua with the capacity to hold over eight hundred (800) persons.

“This is to reduce the time required for irregular migrants intercepted in the Southern Bahamas to be returned to their home countries.

"I warned persons that any undocumented migrants will be taken into custody on January 18.  This was extended to persons working without a valid Work Permit or working outside the scope of their work permit.  This warning was further extended to persons who enter the Country as a visitor and illegally engage in employment and/or unlawful activities.”

The Immigration Enforcement Unit conducted operations to infiltrate a number of ‘escort services,’ January 19.  It is well known that these escort services consist of persons who enter the country as 'visitor' and also overstay the time granted by immigration to remain in the country.

In one operation, an escort service known as 'The Mango Season Girls' was dismantled.  Four Jamaican females were taken into custody in that sting operation.  They were charged and placed before the courts, convicted, sentenced, deported and placed on the restricted List.

On the 20th January, 2023, a joint operation by Immigration and the Royal Bahamas Police Force in the eastern area netted a number of irregular migrants, one of whom was found in possession of a fraudulent Work Permit.

Just a matter of days after his last address, “a vessel carrying 396 irregular migrants from Haiti was intercepted by the United States Coast Guard in the vicinity of Cay Sal Bank.   "In accordance with our plans to address an increase in interceptions, the Coast Guard was directed to transport the intercepted migrants to the temporary facility at Inagua where 375 migrants were handed over to Bahamian officials on January 24.  Some 21 migrants (mainly minors) remained with the Coast Guard on their vessel."

He explained, with the activation of the temporary facility in Inagua, the Government moved to quickly deploy additional resources to support the facility.  The Ministry of Health mobilized a team of Nurses and Physicians to fly to Inagua where they erected a field hospital donated by the United States government.  Food and other supplies were shipped in by the HMBS Lawrence Major.

"The Royal Bahamas Police Force and The Royal Bahamas Defence Force continue to assist the Department in providing additional security on the Island.

"Unfortunately, the interception near Cay Sal was not isolated.  On the 24th January - The Department of Immigration was notified that a vessel carrying unlawful entrants from the Republic of Haiti ran aground in the area of The Bluff, South Andros.  Officers from The Royal Bahamas Police Force, stationed in South Andros moved swiftly and apprehended a number of the unlawful entrants to our shores.  Combined with reinforcement teams from the Defence Force and Bahamas Immigration, a total of 41 persons were taken into custody following a full search of the area and surrounding communities.  The 41 persons were subsequently transported to the Detention Centre here in New Providence."

On Monday the 30th of January, Immigration Officials received notification of a suspected smuggling vessel sinking in the vicinity of Grand Bahama.  Law enforcement officials quickly mobilized and 19 individuals were taken into custody.  

They Included:

• Eleven Haitian Nationals
• Two Ecuadorian nationals
• Two Chinese Nationals

Further, four Bahamian Males suspected of being the organizers were arrested and are expected to be placed before the Courts along with this group once the investigations are concluded.

"We are challenged, but yes, we are prepared; yes, we are ready and yes, with God’s grace and mercy, we will ride this wave!  In my earlier communication, I issued a stern warning and advised the Bahamian people that any and all unlawful entrants will be swiftly processed and repatriated to their homeland."

Three repatriation exercises were undertaken, recently, by the Immigration Department totaling 251 persons including

• Thirty-one Cuban Nationals
• Two hundred-and-twenty Haitian nationals

 Source

...the Hemispheric Declaration on Migration and Protection of Migrants imposed by Washington at the Ninth Summit of the Americas "is an example of its racist, xenophobic and plundering vision of migrants. It does not address in any way the real causes of migration"

The regional approach to the issue of migration in The Americas by the United States denounced!

The fall of the world GDP, which is around 10%, plus poverty and inequality, will increase the migratory pressure... in 2021 alone, one out of every 88 inhabitants of the planet left their native country 

 

More and more people die trying

People will not stop migrating and they will do so even if the conditions worsen, there is no legal protection and they can be at the mercy of various forms of violence and exploitation, ranging from underground human trafficking networks to various forms of fraud in the destination countries, where they will become a new layer of ultra-precarious migrants.

By  Francisco Arias Fernández | informacion@granmai.cu

An incident on Friday July 1st at Morocco’s border with Spain left 37 irregular migrants dead and hundreds injured, 13 of them seriously.  The repercussions were that of an international scandal and calls for a thorough investigation by the United Nations raised from everywhere.

The victims died as a result of military repression, crushing or suffocation, when there was a human avalanche and they were trapped in a watercourse near the border.

While authorities put the blame on the organized crime, the spokesman of the Secretary General of the United Nations Organization believes there was an excessive use of force on both sides of the border.

Referring to what many media have described as a "massacre," UN official Stéphane Dujarric pointed out that authorities observed an "excessive use of force," which is "unacceptable" and therefore must be investigated.  He recalled that States "have obligations" under the international law and human rights.

For its part, the UN Committee for the Protection of Migrant Workers and their Families urged the governments of Spain and Morocco to "immediately" open a "thorough, independent and transparent" investigation, to which both parties agreed.

Three days later, on the other side of the Atlantic, in San Antonio, Texas, United States, 51 irregular migrants were found suffocated in the trailer of a truck.  Sixteen were rescued alive, including four minors.

Translated by ESTI

The discovery was made after screams were heard from inside the container on the truck, which had no water, air conditioning or oxygen, while the temperatures outside were around 40 degrees Celsius.

In addition, someone detected a corpse in the vicinity of the truck, abandoned near a military base, 16 kilometers from San Antonio and 250 kilometers from the Mexican border.

The first investigations point to three detainees.  Moreover, the vehicle's license plate was from the United States, which made it easier for it to cross the border without being subject to mandatory inspection.

The White House has committed itself to clarify the facts and dismantle the trafficking networks, at a time when the country reports high immigration peaks and a new record of illegal entry registration, with more than 239,000 in May, most of which cross through the border with Mexico.

A few hours later, it was known that the most recent tragedy in the Central Mediterranean left more than 22 missing migrants and 71 survivors; while another 500 people rescued and on board ships of European humanitarian organizations were waiting to be taken to the mainland.

NEWS THAT IS NO LONGER

Migration news have long been prominent in mainstream media all over the world; but they grow in frequency and cruelty as the world economic crisis, war conflicts, the impact of the pandemic, poverty, famine, blockades, sanctions, political manipulation of the issue and many other factors deepen, which have led experts to affirm that we are going through one of the greatest migratory crises in history, with more than one hundred million displaced persons in the last two years, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

The agency indicates that, in 2021 alone, one out of every 88 inhabitants of the planet left their native country.

It adds that 83% of global migrants move to low- and middle-income countries, which are sometimes transit points to destinations such as the United States or the European Union, but the "migration shielding" policies of these countries often cut off migrants before they reach their destination.

The Missing Migrants project of the International Office for Migration (IOM) recently revealed that more than 4,000 deaths per year have been recorded on migration routes around the world since 2014, but this is a minimum estimate, because most of these deaths go unrecorded.

The report adds that since 1996 there have been more than 75,000 deaths in the attempt to migrate, and 48,423 from January 1, 2014 to 2022.  These statistics partially reflect the disaster because they do not include the level of suffering it generates in relatives and confirm the dangers or risks of facing the adventure.

The three most lethal points, according to the IOM project, are the Mediterranean Sea, with 23,900 migrants dead or missing; Africa, with 11,400, and America with 6,200, 60% on the border of Mexico and the United States.

According to experts, there will be more migrants and more will die in the attempt, as it has become a trend in the last two years, a trend that will worsen in the long term, as the enormous recession generated by the pandemic will drastically change migration.

The fall of the world GDP, which is around 10%, plus poverty and inequality, will increase the migratory pressure.

They estimate that people will not stop migrating and they will do so even if the conditions worsen, there is no legal protection and they can be at the mercy of various forms of violence and exploitation, ranging from underground human trafficking networks to various forms of fraud in the destination countries, where they will become a new layer of ultra-precarious migrants, according to the digital media IzquierdaWeb.

The lack of seriousness by some countries in the search for concrete solutions to these serious phenomena, together with the growing tendency to polarization and conflict between powers, are considered obstacles to solving problems that require integrated or coordinated responses at the international level.

Recently, the Cuban Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, in addressing the regional approach to the issue by the United States, denounced that the Hemispheric Declaration on Migration and Protection of Migrants imposed by Washington at the Ninth Summit of the Americas "is an example of its racist, xenophobic and plundering vision of migrants.  It does not address in any way the real causes of migration".

He reaffirmed that "it will be impossible to obtain concrete results in the management of irregular migratory flows if there is no genuine dialogue and collaboration among all the governments involved to respond to a problem of a global nature."

Source

The issue of Haitian migrants and persons of Haitian descent living in The Bahamas

Call To Stop Discrimination

By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Staff Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

THE Bahamas government must work to address discriminatory practices towards persons of Haitian descent who apply for regularisation, an official from the Haitian Embassy said yesterday.

Wallenson Nobert, first secretary of Legal Affairs at the Haitian Embassy, charged that the “real problem” faced by the Haitian Bahamian community in the Bahamas stems from the absence of a clear legal framework to process migrants.

In response to a panel discussion hosted by the College of the Bahamas on the complex issue of statelessness within the Bahamian context, Mr Nobert challenged that the use of the term “stateless” to describe unregularised persons of Haitian descent was “inappropriate” given Haiti’s citizenship laws.

However, Mr Nobert said there was an inherent “hypocrisy” in the Bahamas’ handling of citizenship that allowed for a peculiar stratification of rights, adding “either you’re a part of a country, or you’re not”.

Led by Dr Ian Bethell-Bennett, associate professor in the School of English Studies, presenters focused on the effectiveness of citizenship and related immigration policy, and its application in respect to Haitian migrants and persons of Haitian descent living in the Bahamas.

The panel discussion is the second of its kind for the college, which hosted the first panel on the issue in 2012.

COB student Fiona Joseph argued that the regularisation process has deferred the dreams of many persons of Haitian descent born in the Bahamas, who are forced to wait until they are 18 to begin a lengthy application process.

Ms Joseph gave a personal account of her regularisation process as an individual born in the Bahamas to Haitian parents in her presentation entitled, Stateless and (Ba)Haitian in The Bahamas.

She admitted that she did not apply for Haitian citizenship because it would have further complicated her bid for Bahamian citizenship by forcing her to seek naturalisation instead.

Earlier this month, Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell confirmed to The Tribune that the government does not issue certificates of identity.

He said: “I do not believe that there is a large group of stateless people. What we have is people born to foreign parents who don’t want to get the passport of their parents. We have stopped issuing certificates of identity.”

In his presentation entitled “Statelessness: Real or Imagined?” Dr Bethell-Bennett charged that while states argue over whether or not statelessness exists, and what type, the reality remains that a large group of people in the Bahamas are trapped in a “grey zone”, disfranchised and unable to access basic rights attached to citizenship.

The large population of unregularised persons represents a critical national security issue, according to Dr Ian Strachan, COB’s vice president of Advancement, who stated that progress on the issue has been stalled because of citizenship’s value as a political bargaining chip.

In his presentation, “Ugly Politics: Haitians and Power in the Bahamas”, Dr Strachan argued that immigration policy and procedures have been used for political advancement over the last 30 years, perpetuating negative stereotypes towards persons of Haitian descent while exploiting the migrant community during the election period.

Presenter Stephen Aranha, assistant professor in the School of Social Sciences, provided a critical review of citizenship as defined by the Bahamas constitution, and the recommendations given by the 2012 Constitutional Commission.

Although Haitians represent the largest migrant community, Mr Aranha argued that Immigration processes in the Bahamas were arbitrary, and open to legal uncertainty for all migrants.

Haiti’s constitution affords individuals born of a “native born” Haitian parent automatic entitlement to citizenship, if they choose to accept it, according to Mr Nobert, who encouraged individuals of Haitian lineage to seek assistance from the embassy regardless of their status.

However, presenters argued that the law is not clear on whether or not this right is passed on to third generation descendants whose parents were not born in Haiti, or have no legal documentation.

Presenters called for the government to either lower the age requirement for persons to begin applications for citizenship, or do an overhaul of the requirements to bring them in line with migration realities.

Mr Nobert’s comments echo concerns raised by the United Nations Human Rights Council, most recently the need for strengthened reporting mechanisms and statistical research on migrant communities in the Bahamas.

April 11, 2014

Tribune 242