Unfurling of a crisis

The prickly story of a Venezuelan mother, overstaying her time in TT because of pregnancy, then trading her two-month old baby boy to a local couple for US$20,000, has many troubling dimensions. According to the available narrative, a mother, a Venezuelan, could find no recourse for her situation here but to trade her child's life for desperately needed cash. Add a couple who wanted a child and were willing to pay for that responsibility.

Clearly the circumstances, which might have gone poorly for the child, should have been managed by the relevant local authorities. Perhaps an alternative might have been possible for the mother, and other options made available for a home willing and capable of caring for a child.

When the mother had second thoughts at home in Venezuela, things went askew and the well-meaning couple who appear to have embraced their responsibilities as care providers, might find themselves accused of human trafficking. This is a situation which could have had very different outcomes.

In May, an Interpol operation to bust an international hum trafficking ring rescued 350 people who were potential victims of sexual exploitation and forced labour. Victims of the ring were found working in mines, nightclubs and factories, young women were forced into prostitution to serve remote Guyanese gold mines. TT was one of 13 countries that worked on Operation Libertad over the course of two and a half years.

It's been estimated that there are 120,000 illegal immigrants in TT, a number that suggests that one in seven people is in the country illegally. That's fertile ground for exploitation. Shankar Teelucksingh, a councillor for Cedros, estimates that at least 1,500 illegal landings of citizens of Venezuela happen weekly and believes that as many as 75 per cent of arriving women end up sex workers.

A Debe man was arrested recently after a video surfaced of the beating of a young Venezuelan woman with a wheel spanner. An officer of the Inter-Agency Task Force was called on to explain why there were two illegal Venezuelan women in his car six weeks ago.

The unfortunate mother is another Venezuelan refugee story demanding the attention of a government that's yet to take a clear and unequivocal position on the influx of Venezuelans now living in TT, whose situations are often dire and continue to inspire no formal engagement by the state. The absence of a clear national plan for the influx of Venezuelan refugees is inexcusable, and the fate of that young boy is a flare of warning.

These circumstances are a breeding ground for injustice and cruelty, and the fuzziness of the TT response is appalling.