by RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Dozens of Venezue­lan asy­lum seek­ers and refugees flocked to the Our La­dy of Per­pet­u­al Help RC Church in San Fer­nan­do on Mon­day, hop­ing to get as­sis­tance ahead of the gov­ern­ment's May 31 reg­is­tra­tion.

From as ear­ly as 7 am, the Venezue­lans gath­ered at the church on Har­ris Prom­e­nade where they were in­ter­viewed by of­fi­cials from the Liv­ing Wa­ters Com­mu­ni­ty.

A spokesman at the church said through the Liv­ing Wa­ters Com­mu­ni­ty, Venezue­lans get as­sis­tance with hous­ing, health, ed­u­ca­tion, doc­u­men­ta­tion, se­cu­ri­ty and oth­er so­cial ser­vices. Liv­ing Wa­ters Com­mu­ni­ty is al­so the im­ple­ment­ing agency for the Unit­ed Na­tions Refugee Agency (UNCHR).

Venezue­lan na­tion­al Joseph Figuera, his wife Daniel­la and their daugh­ter Vic­to­ria were among those who came for help.

Figuera said he came to Trinidad nine months ago and was in­ter­est­ed in get­ting reg­is­tered as an asy­lum seek­er.

Asked how he was cop­ing, Figuera said his moth­er was Trinida­di­an so he was far­ing bet­ter than most Venezue­lans.

Dur­ing the in­ter­view, a se­cu­ri­ty guard at the com­pound called Figuera and told him he will not get any help if he spoke to the Guardian.

Ear­li­er the same guard barred Guardian Me­dia from en­ter­ing the church com­pound say­ing it was pri­vate prop­er­ty.

She said she had in­struc­tions from se­nior of­fi­cials not to al­low the Guardian in­side their premis­es.

Oth­er Venezue­lans who stopped to talk with the Guardian out­side the church gates were ad­vised not to com­ment if they want­ed help.

How­ev­er, when con­tact­ed, an of­fi­cial from the UN­HCR, the UN Refugee Agency said it works close­ly with the Liv­ing Wa­ters Com­mu­ni­ty to en­sure that Venezue­lans who flee­ing the hor­rif­ic con­di­tions in their home­land are treat­ed well.

A se­nior of­fi­cial at Liv­ing Wa­ters Com­mu­ni­ty said it con­ducts reg­is­tra­tion twice week­ly on Mon­days and Thurs­days at Our La­dy of Per­pet­u­al Help Church.

UN­HCR Reg­is­tra­tion staff con­duct reg­is­tra­tion in­ter­views, en­roll per­sons in UN­HCR’s Bio­met­ric Iden­ti­ty Man­age­ment Sys­tem (BIMS), and is­sues and re­news UN­HCR doc­u­men­ta­tion.

Un­der the UN­HCR, asy­lum seek­ers have the right to live in an en­vi­ron­ment free from dis­crim­i­na­tion, re­gard­less of eth­nic­i­ty, colour, sex, lan­guage, re­li­gion, po­lit­i­cal opin­ion, na­tion­al­i­ty, eco­nom­ic po­si­tion, birth­place or any oth­er per­son­al at­tribute.

Ac­cord­ing to the Uni­ver­sal De­c­la­ra­tion of Hu­man Rights, any per­son whose life is in dan­ger in their own coun­try has the right to seek pro­tec­tion and asy­lum in an­oth­er coun­try.

The Con­sti­tu­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go guar­an­tees rights with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion on the ba­sis of race, ori­gin, colour, re­li­gion or sex.

On May 31, Venezue­lans who do not have a crim­i­nal record will be reg­is­tered in T&T.

Once they are cleared, they will be giv­en the op­por­tu­ni­ty to live and work in T&T for a year.