Government’s registration plan for Venezuelans — expected to be finalised next week— will be conducted at five centres throughout T&T and Venezuelans will have to report to authorities six months after registration to ensure their information remains accurate.
National Security Minister Stuart Young revealed this at yesterday’s post-Cabinet media conference. Young presented a note to Cabinet yesterday on how to deal with the Venezuelans in T&T and his ministry’s planned amnesty plan for them to live and work here for one year via a registration process.
He said the matter will be taken to Cabinet’s Finance and General Purposes (F&GP) sub-committee on Monday for detailed scrutiny.
“This policy has very far-reaching effects, there are a lot of things to consider on Monday. Thereafter, F&GP will hopefully make recommendations to Cabinet next week Thursday.”
He told the T&T Guardian he’s hoping it will be finalised imminently.
Young said Monday’ s meeting will discuss resources —including registration forms— necessary for the registration drive. Discussions will also focus on education for Venezuelan children.
He said the registration period will take place over two weeks at the five local centres. It cuts off after two weeks and systems will revert to normal immigration law. Centres are expected to be announced once the plan is approved.
Registration “ identification” cards will identify Venezuelans who register with the Ministry in the process. They’ll have to report to authorities six months after registration to confirm the information on their cards remains accurate.
Young agreed the cards will require some security feature to prevent duplication.
“Unfortunately sometimes there are those who try to duplicate. That’s one of Monday’s discussions items to see what security features we can have on (cards),”
Asked whether Government would consider a similar registration card for Caricom and Haitian nationals in T&T - since their documents are large- Young said this did come up in Cabinet discussion and he was sure it’d come up in Monday’s F&GP meeting, whether Government needs to take a decisions soon after, on this for such people.
But he said Monday’s ‘s note for F&GP scrutiny only deals with Venezuelans since there’s a situation developing daily with such persons. He said he recently visited the Immigration Detention Centre where the majority of people there are Venezuelans, but only two or three Caricom nationals.
Cabinet yesterday also approved financing from Australia’s Export Financing Corporation (EFC) for the acquisition of the two new fast ferries which Government is buying from Australian shipbuilders Austal and Incat.
He said EFC will handle financing for up to 80 per cent of costs and Government will raise the other 20 per cent