IT WAS sheer drama when a 21-year-old Venezuelan woman appeared at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court Monday afternoon charged with entering Guyana illegally.Yanelda Vellada, a mother of two, was brought before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan for entering Guyana illegally by sea between January 1 and January 28 at Eteringbang, on the Cuyuni River, and disembarking without presenting herself to an immigration officer.

Speaking through an interpreter, the woman denied the charge, and wept bitterly as she stood barefooted aside the prisoners’ dock. The woman explained that she came to work in Guyana since Venezuela was hard and there was no work.

Police Prosecutor Deniro Jones had strongly opposed to the woman being released on bail since the foreign national has no ties to Guyana and was therefore a flight risk.
Jones further explained that Vellada was nabbed by police during a road block in Linden on Saturday.

The Magistrate ruled in the prosecution’s favor and remanded the woman until February 1 for the commencement of her trial.

Before her arraignment, Yanelda had created a ruckus in the court lockup, causing a female rank to accost her as she attempted to flee from police custody.
The woman was shouting in Spanish, pacing back and forth speaking in Spanish tongue as she continued to weep bitterly.

Last year over 16 Venezuelan nationals were fined and deported to their homeland after entering Guyana illegally for ‘betterment,’ because of the economic crisis in their country.