The Tribune

By EARYEL BOWLEG

Tribune Staff Reporter

ebowleg@tribunemedia.net

BAHAMIAN Todd Eldon is stuck in Canada and trying to get back home.

He is currently living in a hotel with plans to stay there until May, but said his funds are running low.

He was set to leave Canada and return home when Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced last month that the country’s main airlines (Air Canada, WestJet, and Sunwing) were cancelling all services to Caribbean destinations and Mexico until April 30.

The frustrated 44-year-old told The Tribune he contacted both the Bahamas High Commission and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but “nothing changed”. He called the Bahamas government “absolutely worthless” when contacted for an update on his troubles.

“They made it sound like they was gonna do something ….they wouldn’t return my call until I started just saying ‘Well why don’t you tell me (explicit) off,” he said over the phone yesterday.

“I’m trying to get home coming through Panama and only two flights going into The Bahamas and out of The Bahamas are coming from America. Nothing coming from Europe. I was gonna fly to London and then fly back to The Bahamas and they stop that. Ain’t no flights coming from London no more.

“They worried about every American coming to that island and every other (persons) coming to that island. They don’t care about Bahamians and they definitely don’t care about you if ain’t in The Bahamas. That’s abundantly clear.”

He arrived in Canada 15 months ago and was going through an immigration process there. Mr Eldon’s wife is a Canadian citizen.

He explained during an earlier interview: “I was going for permanent residency and then COVID just screw everything up. It was supposed to take three months. It just never happened.

“We were on our way moving back to The Bahamas. We got rid of our apartment, our car, my spouse resigned her job and we were about to go to Vancouver to take her COVID test to come back to Nassau and then they cancelled all the flights.

“After today I’m homeless, without a car, in Canada in minus 15 degree celsius temperature. Now I gotta move into a hotel and pray to God now something happens quickly because without having a source of income, our funds are getting depleted at a rapid state.”

When asked what his communication was like with the Bahamas High Commission, he recalled speaking to a man who gave him advice.

“His advice was to try to get a visa from the US consulate in Vancouver and so I tried to do that and the earliest appointment that I could get to try to get a visa was like August 20 towards the end of this year and, of course, that’s not going to help me any seeing that it’s February,” he said.

Then Mr Eldon called an emergency number and was then put in touch with someone, who he believes is to deal with these situations from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The individual was trying to get him a transit visa.

But the issue is still unsettled, he said yesterday. He is outraged at the little help he has received.

“I have no idea what I’m gonna, but I’m going to have to do (it),” he said, when asked how he would find the money he needs.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a previous statement that it had no reports of Bahamians being stuck in Canada after airlines’ cancelled all Caribbean flights.

However, the Nassau-born Spanish Wells resident claimed he knew other Bahamians in the same situation.

“There are two more people from Spanish Wells, well they got their children in school, and they got the same problem and a friend of mine got three friends from Nassau who have the same problems,” he said.

Attempts were made by this newspaper to call the High Commission in Canada during business hours, but a recording said the office was closed.