Rhon­dor Dowlat

For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter Den­nis Moses is ex­pect­ed to re­view a re­port sent by se­nior im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers about 12 Ja­maican na­tion­als who were de­nied en­try in­to T&T over the East­er week­end.

The T&T Guardian un­der­stands that the re­port has cleared all im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers who were on du­ty at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port on the day that the Ja­maicans would have ar­rived via two sep­a­rate flights.

Af­ter be­ing re­fused en­try to T&T, the Ja­maicans turned to so­cial me­dia call­ing for all Ja­maicans to boy­cott vis­it­ing T&T and us­ing any T&T prod­ucts. The Ja­maicans claimed that they were ill-treat­ed and made to lie on the cold ground to sleep while they were be­ing processed to be sent back home. Some of them claimed that they were al­so de­nied food and wa­ter.

How­ev­er, a se­nior of­fi­cial at the Im­mi­gra­tion Di­vi­sion, who wished not to be iden­ti­fied, told the T&T Guardian that no im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer, af­ter a thor­ough in­ves­ti­ga­tion was con­duct­ed, was found to have act­ed ir­re­spon­si­bly or in a dis­crim­i­na­to­ry man­ner to­wards the Ja­maicans.

It was, how­ev­er, found that the Ja­maican na­tion­als were not ad­mis­si­ble based on their de­c­la­ra­tions and on in­ter­views con­duct­ed by im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers, the source said.

The T&T Guardian was al­so told that three per cent of all ar­riv­ing pas­sen­gers in­to T&T are re­fused en­try and the few who are sent back to their re­spec­tive home coun­tries do not sat­is­fy the re­quire­ments for en­try.

The im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cial al­so made ref­er­ence to the Im­mi­gra­tion Act, which clar­i­fies the role of the trans­porta­tion com­pa­ny that would have brought the Ja­maican na­tion­als to the coun­try.

"The Act Sec­tion 33 and 34 states: The trans­porta­tion com­pa­ny that brought to T&T a per­son seek­ing ad­mis­sion there­to shall pay all costs of his de­ten­tion," the of­fi­cial said.

The of­fi­cial added that ac­cord­ing to the act, all trans­porta­tion com­pa­nies are "di­rect­ed to pay de­por­ta­tion or re­jec­tion costs" for pas­sen­gers and "at their ex­pense de­tain and guard safe­ly the per­son con­cerned un­til he can be placed on board the ves­sel on which he is to be car­ried" and al­so to "treat in a hu­mane man­ner and feed such per­son."

Ef­forts to reach an of­fi­cial at state-owned Caribbean Air­lines, who brought in the Ja­maican na­tion­als, for com­ment yes­ter­day were un­suc­cess­ful.