V’zuelan registration cards distributed from today

NATIONAL Security Minister Stuart Young said about 13,000 Venezuelans who registered last month will begin receiving their registration cards from today.

He was speaking yesterday at the post-Cabinet media conference.

Young said of the 16,523 Venezuelans registered, from May 31-June 14, about 2,300 are children. The cards are only being distributed to those over 16. He said Government has always stressed that a due-diligence process must be done and information had to be sourced from Venezuela.

A number of people who came to be registered had no passports or identification cards, he said, and it had to be verified that they were who they said they were, and that they were from Venezuela as they claimed.

Since there are about 13,000 cards, it will take some time to distribute them, but he could not say how long, or how many failed the due-diligence process.

The cards distributed today will include security features.

He added there is no cost to Venezuelans, but if the cards are lost, just like driver’s permits and identification cards, it should be reported to the police.

For those who are not registered, he warned, the normal laws of TT will apply. At the sod-turning ceremony for the Carenage Police Station on Tuesday the Prime Minister said unregistered Venezuelans found in the country will be deported.

After the end of the registration process, a visa process was implemented for Venezuelans. Young said he had not heard any complaints about the visas and the system is up and running.