— between the period 2015 to 2021, according to immigration data

THE decision by the Government of Guyana to implement a visa requirement for Haitian and Cuban nationals travelling to the country is one that is being taken to tackle and avert Guyana being used as a transshipment destination for human smuggling.

According to immigration data provided to the Guyana Chronicle, for the period 2015 to June 17, 2021, there has been an unusually large influx of Haitian nationals who have entered Guyana but failed to leave, at least through the requisite legal channels.

The statistics highlight that of the 42,100 arrivals of Haitian nationals for the stated period, some 38,187 of them cannot be accounted for. Only 3,913 have been registered to have legally departed the shores of Guyana.

The data shows that from 2015 to 2020, there was a steep and continuous annual increase of Haitian nationals arriving in the country.

In 2015, there were some 770 arrivals, while 2016 saw 772, which quickly escalated to 3,515 in 2017, then to 6,165 in 2018 and 20,261 in 2019. The year 2020 saw 9,239 entries and as of June 17, 2021, there have been some 1,378.

However, the departure data for the stated period when compared with the arrival data is staggering. In 2015, only 136 of the Haitian nationals departed while in 2016 some 451 left. In 2017, there were some 291 departures; 2018 saw 456 and 2019 1,697. For the year 2020, there were some 717 departures and as of June 17, 2021, there were some 165.

Attorney-General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, S.C., on Tuesday, during his television programme ‘Issues in the News’, disclosed that as a means to stymie this phenomenon, the Government of Guyana will be implementing visa requirements for Haitian and Cuban nationals, as the data is similar for Cubans as well.

CANNOT BE TOLERATED

“We have to take a position against our country being used as an international smuggling transshipment point,” Nandlall said, as he highlighted that various international agencies which bear responsibility for human trafficking and human smuggling have already been apprised, including but not limited to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, INTERPOL and International Organisation for Migration (IOM).

Nandlall explained that Guyana will be joining most Caribbean countries that have already made the decision to impose visa requirements for Haitians and Cubans. According to the website VisaIndex, only three Caribbean countries, namely, Grenada, St. Vincent & the Grenadines and Montserrat, have a visa free immigration policy in relation to the Haitians.

“We had already made contact with the American Embassy on a different occasion to complain about Cubans as well as the Haitians; we complained to the Cuban Embassy as well,” he said.

Just last week, 10 young Haitian nationals, five females and five males, were found by police at the Swiss Hotel, Skeldon, Corentyne, Berbice, Region Six (East Berbice – Corentyne). They had informed the authorities that the person who brought them reportedly took away their passports, documents, money and other personal belongings.

“It has long been suspected that there is a huge trafficking in persons and human smuggling ring, including children, taking place in the region and Guyana is being used as a transit point in this racket.… This is the latest manifestation of this nefarious racket at work which seems to be operating on a daily basis,” a press release from the Government of Guyana on the matter had stated.

CLASSIC TRAPPINGS

“One of the 10 speak English; these are the classic trappings of a smuggling ring where you have young women, young men, just teenagers and people deposited … they came to Guyana illegally and the person just disappear with their passports and they are left now to become a charge on the State of Guyana in a hotel room,” Nandlall said.

Those individuals are now at the Hugo Chavez Centre for Rehabilitation and Reintegration where they are being taken care of, as police continue their investigations in an effort to arrest the man, or woman, who have custody of the their documents.

On February 28, 2021, the Brazilian Federal Police arrested 26 Haitian nationals and one Cuban, who entered Bom Fim illegally via Guyana’s borders. Nandlall explained that the Brazilian Government has expressed deep concern about Guyana being used as a transshipment point for Haitians and other nationals entering its borders.

During his programme, Nandlall also referenced the 26 Haitian nationals who were detained in Guyana in November 2020 after the address they provided to the immigration authorities turned out to be the location of Suriname Airways, along with an empty lot.

The government had come under heavy scrutiny for detention of the said Haitians, with accusations of racial discrimination by a major opposition party. A lawsuit was also subsequently filed by one Allandres Archer on behalf of the Haitians, which he eventually withdrew.

Archer, a businessman and ticket agent, had purchased airline tickets which brought the Haitians to Guyana. He had explained that he was “contacted by Attorney-at Law Darren Wade, to give an affidavit to be a witness and it ended up I was the person who was taking the government to court”.

Nandlall is of the opinion that the main opposition party, the APNU+AFC, will play the “race card” upon hearing the news that Government of Guyana will be implementing a visa requirement for Haitian nationals.

“And of course we will have to deal with the allegations of race because that is all that the APNU+AFC do … they see the world through a racial prism, every decision that this government makes they apply a racial analysis to it,” he said.

“Everything for them is about race, if you dismiss somebody is because of their race, if you charge someone is because of their race, if a car hit down somebody is because of their race … these people are diabolical, they are sick,” he added.

This is not the first time Government has indicated the intention of imposing visa restrictions on Haitian nationals to eradicate Guyana being a transshipment point for human smuggling. In November last year Minister of Home Affairs, Robeson Benn had shared similar sentiments.