The Tribune

What happened to Jean Rony Jean-Charles should never have happened to anyone, but it did. A man born in The Bahamas, picked up in an immigration raid, deported to Haiti, feared missing or the victim of an accident or worse, located weeks later (by a reporter for this newspaper) living in the bush in the country where he knew no one, had no papers, could not work and was more terrified than ever, his story is disconcerting to a point of alarming.

The day-by-day play, the almost daily appearances in court, marching in awaiting others to determine his fate, winning a round or a motion, losing the next, then winning and losing again, in and out of handcuffs, sounds like rich copy material for a made-for-Hollywood documentary. Jean Rony’s story reveals the human side of a man’s struggle who, despite top pro bono legal advice working feverishly to protect him, faces a system seemingly rigged against him. He is marginalised and disenfranchised. He is, like 10 million people around the world, stateless until proven otherwise.

What we can say at this juncture is limited. Following last week’s decision by the appeal court that found a lower court erred, overstepping its jurisdiction by ordering immigration officials to provide Mr Jean-Charles with documents so that he may live and work in the land of his birth. The subject’s attorney, Fred Smith, QC, has vowed to take the matter to the Privy Council.

Without commenting directly on the case, we feel the underlying matters that gave rise to this predicament where a man born in The Bahamas may or may not be entitled to live and work here must be addressed. If the case of Jean-Charles, born to a Haitian mother, has made an undereducated humble man a poster face for equality, the country will be the better for it.

Despite celebrating a win on Thursday when the appeal court ruled in favour of the government, Attorney General Carl Bethel gave the pubic a tongue-lashing saying that if voters had not been so vengeful about another matter - referring to the decision to legalise gaming despite a referendum vote against it - the referendum that would have granted equality would likely have passed. It was almost like scolding a naughty child – see what you got for what you did.

The Bahamas is one of two countries in the region and about 25 in the world of more than 200 which does not grant equal rights to women. A child born abroad to a Bahamian woman who is married to a non-Bahamian is not guaranteed citizenship and the application process can be very difficult. Ironically, an unmarried woman has greater privileges to pass the right of citizenship on to offspring. Only The Bahamas and Barbados have failed to abide the recommendations of the United Nations Human Rights Commission. There is not a rug large enough to sweep The Bahamas’ human rights violations under. From the intolerable conditions caused by overcrowding of a prison that is supposed to be a corrections centre, to the random raids by immigration authorities that leave people born abroad in a constant state of fear, the lack of respect for human decency speaks loudly and poorly for who we are as a nation.

Moreover, we have to wonder why the Minnis-led government, with all the problems it is facing, is so engaged in the case of a single individual born in The Bahamas?

Immigration is a hot button issue because for so many years the department has been riddled with corruption. We understand that and support every step taken to put in place measures that will standardise applications instead of providing opportunities for a civil servant to “find and move” a file. Dealing with one poor individual is like trying to save a rain forest by plucking a dead leaf off a tree.

Creating numbers of stateless people living in limbo without the ability to bank, to qualify for a mortgage, to own a home, or to participate in many of the activities of a normal working individual will not solve the corruption issue or the larger immigration policy-related matters. All it will do is agitate an already nervous pubic.

Marginalising individuals will not serve to teach a lesson. We do not choose where we are born.

But we can choose what kind of country we want to be and how we want the world to see us. If we want to teach someone a lesson, let’s do it in the classroom. That is where our attention should be. That is where our focus should rest and where our energy should be directed. We must also grasp the importance of efficiency in government.

One of Mr Jean-Charles’ problems stemmed from confusion about his birth certificate. The inexactitude of a system that still relies on hand-written entries causes untold problems. Even today, there are dozens, if not hundreds, of young Bahamians who are not enrolled in school because their mother or guardian did not register their birth or there is an issue with the certificate.

One man has become a yo-yo in a battle now headed all the way to the Privy Council and need never have been. Playing with yo-yos is kid stuff. Time to eliminate the pettiness and act on important policy like better education, efficiency in government, a national development plan, freedom of information. The government was elected on a series of promises. Creating stateless individuals unnecessarily was not one of them.