Explain report

DISCLOSURES made in a recent parliamentary report in relation to claims of sexual exploitation of Venezuelan migrants at the Chaguaramas Heliport are astonishing.

They contradict the line taken by the police and Cabinet ever since it was first reported that a 21-year-old woman had been raped at the facility last year by Coast Guard officials.

When that media report emerged in June, there was pushback.

Snr Supt Claire Guy-Alleyne, head of the police’s Gender Based Violence Unit, said, “No sexual exploitation was disclosed at the location.”

Fitzgerald Hinds, Minister of National Security, said the newspaper report was “erroneous and untrue.” At the same time, he suggested the rape allegation was being investigated, but the victim was un-co-operative.

Camille Robinson-Regis, Leader of Government Business in the House, told MPs no evidence was found. However, she too said the victim “has not provided the police with the support they must have.”

The Prime Minister, questioned days later, said, “The allegations were taken very seriously and the requisite government department went in and investigated and could not find information to take further action at this time.”

But the latest report of Parliament’s human rights committee details statements made to committee members that same month in 2023, during a committee site visit to the heliport by unspecified members of the Coast Guard.

“Officials acknowledged the complaint of sexual misconduct and explained that disciplinary proceedings were ongoing at that time,” the report says.

Against whom proceedings were brought, the nature of the charges, when they were initiated and the status of those implicated – none is specified.

However, the committee detailed further evidence from the site of “obscenities and sexually explicit expressions,” which, in the assessment of its members, raised questions about whether actions had occurred consistent with the claims.

The committee is chaired by Dr Muhammad Yunus Ibrahim, the Vice-President of the Senate, a government appointment. The overwhelming majority of the committee (five out of eight) are government members.

Last year, Mr Hinds, without irony, warned this incident posed the danger of significant reputational harm to this country at a time of increased scrutiny over our record.

But it is one thing to sweep a matter under the carpet; it is another to cover it up completely.

Whether or not members of the Coast Guard have been subject to disciplinary proceedings – and authorities must clarify this – it is clear the heliport facility has long stopped being fit for purpose as an immigration centre, notwithstanding legal vesting as such.

The Defence Force is not meant to deal with migrants; they should never have been allowed to, post-2020. Without special training, the continued reliance on this arrangement by the State has dire implications, as made clear by the committee’s findings and recommendations.