Speaking in Freeport in August Immigration Minister Shane Gibson told of the special treatment given to Haitian immigrants.
He said, unlike all other nationalities that have to pay $10,000 for permanent residency, Haitians pay between $500 and $1,000. Those here for less than 20 years pay $1,000 and those here for more than 20 years pay $500. He, however, did not say how many Haitians were granted permanent residence, presumably with the right to work.
He said that cabinet usually meets once a month “to give status to those who qualify,” and he was the one “responsible for signing off on briefs that go to cabinet, where we actually approve permanent residence and citizenship.” He said that 95 per cent of foreigners sworn in every Monday in New Providence are Haitian.
“Haitians,” he told his Freeport audience, “are treated special and when persons say we don’t treat Haitians right that is absolutely not true.”
We shall now tell the real life story of a Haitian who has been in the Bahamas 26 years, has a passport, an expired work permit and, through his employer, pays National Insurance. We shall then leave it to our readers to judge for themselves the truth of Mr Gibson’s words and decide just how special is “special.”
We always hear so much about what a burden Haitians are on the social services, but what Bahamians fail to realise is that when Haitians want to see a doctor at Princess Margaret Hospital or one of the government clinics they pay $30. Bahamians pay $10.
Now to get back to our Haitian. He applied to us for a gardener’s job in 1993 -13 years ago. On examination of his documents we discovered that he arrived in the Bahamas in 1980 – 26 years ago -had a valid passport and a work permit that had just expired. We had the permit renewed in our name. He has a Haitian wife, two daughters born in Haiti, but raised in the Bahamas, and a son born in the Bahamas. His wife and his two daughters have residence permits to live with him in the Bahamas – at least they had until February this year when we submitted a renewal of residence for them, as well as a renewal of work permit for him. We have heard nothing from these applications, although we have called Immigration and in April sent a reminder note to the department. And so this family is still here, hoping one day to experience that much vaunted “special” treatment, and the department’s new “level of efficiency.”
We have been trying to get legal status for the family so that they no longer have to live like hunted animals, dodging the law. They want to live like other human beings, free to make a contribution to society. Because we knew that asking consideration for them as a family was a policy decision, we wrote to the Minister of Immigration bringing their case to his attention.
Now that the gardener’s eldest daughter is of age we tried to get residence for her so that she could work to contribute to a household of five, living off a gardener’s salary. She is an extraordinarily bright young lady, who speaks and writes English better than many Bahamians. She was in the first graduating class at Doris Johnson High School, a favourite of her teachers, and among the top six in her class.
But one day she was picked up on Bay Street in an Immigration raid. In desperation she had got a job to help support herself and her siblings. She was arrested. Immigration planned to deport her to Haiti, where she has no family and knows no one. Coming from an overly protective home in Nassau, she would have been abandoned in a foreign land to the ruthless mercy of human predators. We intervened. She was released, and sent home where she was left to vegetate, because she had not been given permission to work.
But, being the ambitious young woman that she is, she was not one to sit at home looking at four dull walls. She signed up for a six months training programme at Doctors Hospital to qualify as a doctor’s assistant. The hospital promised that it would hire the top three performers from the class of 20. Of course, she was one of the top three. She was elated. However, when it came time to fill out the job application form she was told that she could not complete the form until she could get a work permit.
A work permit? From where’? How? Where is one to find that government that claims to be so generous?
Here is an exceptionally talented young woman, desperately trying to make a life for herself in a country that she has come to regard as home. But every time she raises a head filled with thoughts of achievement, the heavy hand of the system grinds her back down into the dust.
As the saying goes, “God don’t like ugly.” The day of reckoning is only around the corner for her tormentors.
Imagine since February – eight months ago – in a system boasting a new level of efficiency, to have heard nothing from renewal of permit applications. And after many persistent calls over the years for a decision on the gardener’s permanent residence status, and having been told on February 15, 2005 – last year- that we would have an answer the next day, we are still waiting. Exactly one year and eight months ago, the next day is yet to come.
Editorial from The Tribune
