‘Treat Venezuelans with humanity’

IS there a refugee/immigration/migrant crisis in TT? According to the Prime Minister, there is not. However, he said there was an increase in the number of people who come and go, from Venezuela in particular.

“Some of them would like to remain because of economic circumstances in Venezuela – economic migrants – and as a good neighbour, we allow them to remain. We do not put out a call, ‘Come hither,’ but it is not such that people come here and not meet our humanity.”

Speaking on Monday, Dr Rowley was asked about offering work permits to Venezuelans for a year, but denied that it was “an offer.”

“We are not making a call for Venezuelans to come here, but if they do come, we try to treat with the situation the best we can.

“If we make ourselves a port of call and issue a call for Venezuelans to come to TT – we are a very small country. We have 1.3 million people on a small piece of land. Venezuela has 33 million people on a very large piece of South America.

“But by the same token, the few who have come here are what, 30,000, 40,000, we will establish that very soon, we try to ensure that they are treated as well as we can.”

Asked why TT was not recognising that Venezuela was in a humanitarian crisis and atrocities were being committed on its people, the PM said there was a process for what was happening. He said there were some who were experiencing difficulty with the Venezuelan business model.

Rowley said the anti-Venezuela sentiment did not start with President Nicolas Maduro, but started with former president Hugo Chavez.

“We seem to forget that the Chavez regime was no more popular than Maduro in certain quarters, and when you add the difficulty to treat with the population’s needs, then you move from problem to crisis.

“But that is not a crisis that TT can fix or can address. We are not in the position to fix Venezuela’s problems.”

He said what was being seen in Venezuela was not a regional problem between TT and Venezuela, but an international problem.

Rowley said the government was just concerned that TT did not get the backlash that could come from clashes among countries with interests in Venezuela.

There was very little TT and Caricom could do, he said, to prevent the world superpowers who were now focused on Venezuela from doing what they were doing, except to stand on principle.

“We can’t prevent the US or Colombia from bringing about regime change in Venezuela. What we do know is, our borders would come under tremendous pressure from people who in that circumstance will impact on TT. If there is a military conflict in Venezuela, you think the supply of arms and personnel will be reduced in TT?

“No, it is likely to increase.

“If there is a deterioration in Venezuela’s conditions, does that bring about a reduction in the number of Venezuelans fleeing those conditions? “No, we expect more economic migrants in TT.” The PM also said he did not know of any increased presence of US military in the southwest peninsula.