Tisha Ricketts
In the video below, you will see a group of children being put on buses as Bahamian Immigration officers prepare to deport them along with their parents to Haiti. But what you should know is that these children were born in the Bahamas not in Haiti.
[youlist vid=”JTwAIyBgqpo” showinfo=”0″]
In these situations where illegal Haitian immigrants are being sent back home, is the Bahamian government considering the best interest of Bahamian born children?
Many Bahamians who have been frustrated with their government’s slow action on immigration, will say the law is the law, if you have illegal status in a country then you should expect deportation.
However, when a country deports children born in that country whose parents have no legal status, is that going too far?
But obtaining Bahamian citizenship is not as easy as you may think. Currently, a child born in The Bahamas to a non-Bahamian may apply for citizenship on his or her 18th birthday or in the 12 months that follow.
Although it might seem a bit clearer in terms of the right of citizenship for a child who was not born in Bahamas, for a Bahamian born child, it seems more of a human right.
When I look at this issue from the child’s perspecitive. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child says,
Art. 3 (1): “In all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration.”
With this recent deportation, do you think the Bahamian laws respect the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child?
