Public discourse on the country’s illegal immigration woes continued on Monday during a two-hour town meeting aimed at addressing what has seemingly become the explosive issue of who should become a citizen of The Bahamas and how the country’s Constitution should be written to reflect those views.
The Love 97-sponsored event was held at the St. Agnes Schoolroom and allowed members of the public the opportunity to offer their input on the subject.
Constitutional Review Commission Co-Chairman and former Attorney General Paul Adderley, one of three panelists, pointed out that the citizenship question is a highly complex one.
“People need to understand how many Bahamian men are marrying non-Bahamian women [and] how many women are marrying non-Bahamian men,” Mr. Adderley said. “All of these things have to be taken into consideration when the Constitutional Commission meets and decides on some course of action, which it would suggest that the government ought to follow.”
The Bahamas Constitution entitles any individual born in The Bahamas to foreign parents after July 9, 1973 to apply for citizenship when they reach 18.
But according to Mr. Adderley, based on the feedback garnered from a cross-section of Bahamians during the Constitutional Committee’s town meetings, the suggested time periods for naturalization ranged between five years to never.
Mr. Adderley further stressed that Bahamians should not underestimate an important aspect of Haitian immigration.
“It is in the national interest of Haitians that their people immigrate to the United States, Canada and The Bahamas,” he said.
Also sharing his views was author, playwright, and College of The Bahamas lecturer, Dr. Ian Strachan, who said the modern Bahamas would not be what it is today if not for the work, labour, lives, contribution, know-how, ingenuity and passion of migrants.
As far as Dr. Stachan is concerned, anyone born in The Bahamas should be considered a citizen.
While it is the country’s duty and in best interest of future generations to protect its borders and to enforce its laws, an injustice is being done if such persons are denied this right, he said.
During his presentation, Dr. Strachan also sought to dispel widespread myths about the Haitian community, like the prevailing view that Haitians are more violent than Bahamians and that they generally bring a criminal element to The Bahamas.
“We must understand the background of the people that come here. We must understand too that were it not for education, a change in our status, many middleclass Bahamians would still be having 12 children, like their grandparents did,” Dr. Strachan said.
“[There is the view that] Haitians are coming here to change our culture ﾖ we won’t be Bahamians anymore. Well, you know we need to change some things about our culture. Is it not so that Haitians are here and are working because there are many jobs that we don’t want, many things that since we have risen to this new status of wealth and prosperity, we don’t want to do anymore?”
Dr. Strachan said that illegal Haitian nationals appear to be a people who have escaped poverty, political instability and oppression and who have been paying for 200 years for “an act of singular heroism in the history of mankind.”
“It seems to be that the discussion about Haitian families is an interesting one, excluding all of the problems that we Bahamians have created for ourselves as far as our families go ﾖ from teenage pregnancies to irresponsible fathers,” Dr. Strachan said.
He noted that deciding who becomes a naturalized Bahamian would ultimately entail The Bahamas reexamining how it defines what it is to be a Bahamian and that anyone who comes to The Bahamas with an open heart, who is willing to work, pay taxes and contribute to the country’s development is welcomed.
The third panelist was Dr. Gilbert Morris, an author and an economist, who said The Bahamas owes “a sympathy to those for whom fate and circumstances have not been as kind.”
“When our Haitian friends make mistakes, the consequences are enormous,” Dr. Morris said. “Their population is much larger, their country much older, and the political, economic and military travails greater. The ripple effects more profound.”
He, however, pointed out that it is wrong to enter a country illegally.
According to Dr. Morris, the government should invest in a series of detention centres.
“They can’t simply be holding cells for people, but places where they can be processed effectively, where their medical status and skills analysis could be determined, which may not mean that we will allow them to stay, but at the very least, we have some kind of reading as to who is here and under what conditions,” he said.
“We also have to enforce the law. Once we have a set of rules, those persons who have their own illegal immigrants and want no one to touch them, but despise every other illegal immigrant, must feel the full weight of the law. And finally, as a serious mature country, we need to come up with a solution to the problem in Haiti. We have to be seen to come up with a solution to our regional problems.”
The Bahamas has agreed to join with other CARICOM countries in backing the elections in Haiti slated for later this year in support of political and economic stability.
Macushla N. Pinder, The Bahama Journal
March 2, 2005
