dominican republic

Here is a picture where several Dominicans in New York City are Protesting Haitian Deportations in Dominican Republic.

On Wednesday, June 17, 2015, the Dominicans living in New York came out in a move of solidarity and protest against a controversial Dominican court ruling supporting a debatable immigration policy which may render thousands of Dominican-Haitians stateless. The demonstrators assembled outside their Dominic consulate near the Time Square to show their stance against the anti-racism policy. A 2013 ruling has retroactively changed the nationality criteria for those born to immigrant parents in Haiti since 1929. The ruling was enacted in May 2014 and it allowed the susceptible Dominicans a time limit to establish their citizenship, which expired on June 17, 2015. One of the demonstrators, when asked, has described this move by the Dominican government as unprecedented because there is no other government in the world which could ever do this and it is more surprising because all the international bodies are mum on this. Some of the New York City's elected leaders and officials came out in support of these Dominican-Haitians. Mayor Bill de Blasio, in a statement, has called on the Dominican government to respect and guarantee basic rights to all.

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Here is a long list of haitians in line applying just before the deadline to avoid deportation from Dominican Republic.

Dominican Expected To Begin Deporting Undocumented Immigrants
As the deadline for registering the adjustment of residential status has expired on June 17, 2015, the Dominican Republic is expected to begin deporting an estimated susceptible 500,000 undocumented immigrants of whom most are Haitians or Dominicans of Haitian descent. The D.R. government considers this a legitimate process to deal with the undocumented immigrants while ignoring the distinct characteristics of them. There are two distinct Haitian populations in the D.R-- Haitian immigrants engaged in low wage work and Dominicans of Haitian descent who were born in the country as citizen until a controversial court ruling unlawfully denationalized them in 2013. The majority of them do not speak Creole, know no one in Haiti, but would be uprooted from the place which they have known so far as their home in the Dominican Republic. Historically, many Dominican nationalists, by labeling its darker-skinned inhabitants as 'immigrants', have advocated to expel them from the country.

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If you think you have seen enough about Haitian behaviors, you have not. What you are looking at is what the Haitian government calls Haiti Reception centers for Returnees from Dominican Republic. Some how, the Haitian government expects to receive about 400,000 people in this area. This preparation has been ongoing for over one month now when the government said that this site is subject to welcome our compatriots.

Marie Yolène Gilles, the Programme Manager of the National Network Defenses of Human Rights (RNDDH) has revealed in a statement on June 18, 2015, that no structure has yet been built and nothing concrete step has been taken on the Haitian side of Dominican border other than a poster indicating the proposed site of the shelters on a vast desert. Although since the late May, the government had confidently continued its announcement about two welcome centers for the returnees, the GAAR (Groupe d'Appui aux Rapatriés & Réfugiés) had only traced two trucks, one tractor, two generators and two guards and a placard indicating : Welcome" on the 3 project sites located in Malpasse.

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The Dominican Republic manages to remove the citizenship of up over 200,000 of its people and got away with it. They are Dominicans of Haitian descent.

On June 17, the deadline for registering Haitian migrants on official migration status in the Dominican Republic has expired. Now about 500,000 Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian descent are facing threats of forcible removal. The Dominican Ministry of the Interior has confirmed that those who have failed to fulfill the conditions of residency status will be made to leave the country. The stand of the Dominican government, particularly in relation to the 'Dominicans of Haitian descent' is very strong. From the ongoing situation, it appears that they have initially succeeded to term them as illegal immigrants in their country of birth. An estimated number of 200,000 people of first-generation Haitian residents were born and raised in the D.R who know themselves as Dominicans. They are now being told that they are Haitian and subject to forcible expulsion from a place they call home and to a country where they know no-one.

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Here is a picture where several Dominican Haitians are waiting for regularization of their papers on the Dominican Republic to avoid deportation.

On 18th June, a group of about 1,500 sugarcane workers filed for an injunction in the Superior Administrative Court against the Ministries of Interior and Police, Foreign Affairs, the Presidency, the Central Electoral Board and Immigration Agency to prevent their deportation along with their families.
They prayed to obtain recognition as government contractors. The Court's 1st Civil Chamber has been scheduled for a hearing on July 25th.

There were thousands of confused Haitian undocumented immigrants, including elderly, babies and children were seen among those spending sleepless nights, lined up outside the government regularization processing offices to establish their right to remain in the Dominican Republic or otherwise face deportation.

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Here is a picture of several undocumented Haitians Dominican Sugar cane Workers wait in long lines seeking to establish their legal residence.

The objective of the repatriation was aimed at regulating the continuous flow of migrants from impoverished Haiti to the relatively wealthier D.R. As per Interior Ministry's statement, there could be about 500,000 prospective applicants for residency under the program and of whom about 50,000 people would have a fair chance of granting citizenship. However, as of Wednesday, June 17, about 250,000 people have been registered and as per the officials, only about 10,000 have submitted sufficient required documents. In the final weeks, the number of applicants was far beyond, exceeding the serving capacity of the 36 processing centers under National Plan of Regularization of Foreigners (PNRE), and that made a disorganized process even worse. Many people have all the required documents but could not register due to lack of money, work schedule and overcrowded jumbled serving counters. There were few complaints that some police officers were providing preferential treatment in exchange for bribes.

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Here is a picture marking the end of the time allowed for Haitian migrants looking to establish their residence in the Dominican Republic before a midnight deadline.

In October 2013, the constitutional court of the Dominican Republic announced a decision that stripped an estimated 210,000 people -- about 2% of the country's population -- of their citizenship overnight, most of whom were Haitians and many Dominicans of Haitian descent. However, the government later softened its decision on mounting international pressure and allowed people with birth certificates to "validate" their citizenship, and those without them to register as foreign migrants, but however, with at least one parent must be a citizen or legal resident of D.R in each situation, within a deadline on June 17, 2015, 7:00 pm.

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Here is a picture of Mr. André Daniel Supplice as he was delivering his credentials to Dominican President Danilo Medina in April, 2015

André Daniel Supplice, without proper approval of the Haitian Senate has delivered his credentials to the Dominican President Danilo Medina on Monday, April 20th, 2015, to become the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Haiti to the Dominican Republic. He was accompanied to the ceremony held at the Hall of Ambassadors in the Dominican National Palace by the Vice President Margarita Cedeño de Fernández and Foreign Minister, Andrés Navarro. André Daniel Supplice was born on February 9, 1951 in Port-au-Prince. He is a sociologist and ethnologist. He was graduated from the School of Sociology of the University of Miami, studied at the Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston and the Faculty of Ethnology of the State University of Haiti. His important engagements include: Minister of Haitians Living Abroad (MHAVE), Consul General in Tokyo (Japan), First Secretary of the Embassy of Haiti in Rome (1974-1976) and in Mexico (1976- 1977), Deputy Director General of Immigration and Emigration (1977-1979) and Assistant Secretary of State for the Interior and National Defence (1979-1981).

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Haitian children attending school in Dominican Republic

Since 2010, the number of foreign students in Dominican pre-universities and universities whether it is private, semi-public or public, has been increased significantly and the majority of them are Haitians. At the pre-university level, out of the total 67,000 students, 44,000 (65.7%) students are Haitian and more than 12,000 Haitian students are presently studying in Dominican Universities. The statistics as per 2013 Planning Department of the Ministry of Education Dominican, on the number of Haitian students studying at Pre-university schools reveal that: in public school 37,567, private schools 6,148, and semi-official 595. The percentage of foreign students from 25 countries in the DR is 34.3% and its leading contributors are: United States (12,519), Spain (1,753), Puerto Rico (1,468) and that is followed by other countries like Venezuela, Italy, Cuba, Panama, Germany, China, Peru, Denmark, Russia, Brazil and 560 students come from other countries for a grand total of 67.423 foreign students (pre-university sector).

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As per news report dated March 9th, Blas Peralta, the President of Fenatrado (National Federation of Dominican Transportation) has said that MINUSTAH and National Police of Haiti have jointly established a safe corridor through which the Dominican trucks carrying merchandise from the Dominican Republic to Haiti can carry goods so henceforth under the protection of these two forces. Presently, the insufficient number of MINUSTAH member has forced to limit the stretch of the protective cover. Any driver deviating from the safe corridor will run on own risk. The corridor spans from Jimaní to the Haitian town of Kwadèbouke and from there to the area near the international airport in Port-au-Prince. However, Peralta has insisted for a full safety cover for the Dominican trucks until it completes its journey in Haiti.

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