11-year-old Venezuelan girl to be deported from Trinidad and Tobago

Justice Frank Seepersad has ordered the deportation of an 11-year-old Venezuelan girl from Trinidad and Tobago. The judge refused the application of stay filed by the mother of an eleven-year-old Venezuelan girl who attempted to enter Trinidad and Tobago twice illegally.

Justice in his 32-page ruling on Tuesday rejected the application of the child’s mother, and criticised the woman for “dominating her child to the horrors of the sea and the outrageous flouting of immigration laws, which cannot be disregarded or overlooked.”

He said the statement by the child’s mother was empty of proof that she or her daughter were facing abuse in Venezuela, or that others like them had served from a policy for refugees and asylum-seekers.

The eleven-year-old child’s mother currently lives in Trinidad and Tobago. She also has the United Nations High Commission for Refugee (UNHCR) asylum-seeker status; however, she does not have a valid permit under the government’s amnesty programme.

“The evidence, at this stage, submits to the court that the decision to come to this republic was driven principally by self-centred socio-economic concerns,” he said.

“There are some citizens in this country who are facing difficult economic situations, and they hope to go to another country where economic prospects are brighter, but they cannot and should not be entitled to be refugees or asylum-seeking status under the 1951 Convention (on the Status of Refugees).”

The child was part of a group of 26 who returned to the twin-island Republic illegally on November 24th, two days after they were conducted out of Trinidad and Tobago’s waters by the Coast Guard.