Venezuelans struggle to get photographs for registration

Several Venezuelan migrants scrambled to get photographs of themselves and their children developed this morning, as they were told by registration officers that hard copy prints of their photographs were necessary for processing.

Newsday visited the Queen's Park Oval's, Havelock Street entrance, where over 500 migrants stood in line waiting to be processed. Three migrants approached photographers and asked for pictures of themselves and their children to be taken, as it was required, but were told that there were no means of developing the pictures.

Speaking with Newsday, one migrant said he did not know that hard copy pictures were required as part of the documents for processing.

Newsday spoke with an official from the National Security Ministry who said despite the scramble, migrants were being processed quickly and without incident but was unable to say whether those without pictures would be turned away.

Registration, which was expected to begin at 7 am, began just after 7.20 am, with some migrants camping out along the pavement from as early as 1 am that morning.

Asked why there were so many migrants today compared to opening day on Friday, one migrant said most of the registrants worked during the week and could only find time to come to register on the weekend.