The Tribune

By EARYEL BOWLEG

Tribune Staff Reporter

ebowleg@tribunemedia.net

APPLICATIONS for passports increased in the months after the government gazetted DNA protocols affecting those who were affected by last year’s landmark Privy Council ruling, which established that children born to Bahamian men are citizens at birth in all circumstances.

It is not known whether applications increased because of the new rules. Still, Chief Passport Officer Nicholas Symonette said there has been a steady flow of people presenting with DNA tests to prove paternity since then. He said his office is working with several laboratories to ensure compliance with the rules.

“The Passport Office has seen an uptick of about five per cent in applicants for June and July thus far compared to April and May, and we are enrolling about 8 per cent more applicants than in the same period in 2023,” he said.

The office added additional hours on Saturday to handle summer applicants and encouraged eligible people to apply online through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website.

Mr Symonette also said the Passport Office has seen an increase in cases of people losing their passports, people not realising they need a US visa, not just a police record, to pass through the United States from a third country and people unaware that some countries have a passport validity time to allow entry.

“All countries require a passport to be valid for six months to one year to enter their borders,” he noted, adding that people should research validity requirements and know they can renew their passports one year before expiration.

In May 2023, the Privy Council affirmed that children born out of wedlock to Bahamian men are citizens at birth regardless of their mother’s nationality.

The Passport Office officially began accepting applications from people affected by the ruling in June 2023, as long as the person’s Bahamian father was identified on their birth certificate.

Officials took months to finalise DNA rules, frustrating many.

The DNA test can be done at any laboratory registered and licensed by the Hospitals and Health Facilities Licensing Board to “collect biological specimens for submission to foreign referring laboratories for the purpose of DNA testing and analysis to establish paternity”.

Likewise, any lab in the United States that is an AABB Accredited Relationship DNA Testing Facility can perform the test and report its findings to the chief passport officer.

The person who collects the biological specimen must not have a relationship with any of the people whose specimens are being collected for testing and analysis, be it a spouse, a child, a family member or a friend.

In cases where the applicant’s father has died, alternative sources of biological specimens can be a child of the man alleged to be the applicant’s father, a sibling of the man, a parent of the man or the biological children of the parents of the man alleged to be the father of the applicant.