The 26 Haitians, who were detained and subsequently released by local authorities pending the determination of court proceedings, have left their city dwelling.
This is according to Attorney General Senior Counsel Anil Nandlall who told reporters on Thursday that the persons have disappeared from the Guest House they were staying at on South Road, Georgetown.
“The information I’ve now received is that they’ve all disappeared… they have left,” the Attorney General disclosed.
Meanwhile, when this publication visited the Guest House, it was confirmed that the 26 Haitians, including children, were no longer there.
INews was told that two Route 94 mini-buses (which operate the Georgetown to Lethem Route) on Thursday afternoon picked up all the Haitians from the South Road building and left.
It is unclear whether those persons are still in the country. When contacted, Crime Chief Wendell Blanhum said he was not aware of any development with respect to the Haitians.
It was initially reported that the Haitians were using Guyana as a transit point to get to Brazil and other countries.
However, Nandlall had previously pointed out that Government is grappling with immigrants abusing Guyana as a transit point and noted that the Brazilian government had complained about this practice.
“We have a complaint from the Brazilian Government to say that Guyana is being used as a transhipment point for people smuggling into Brazil. And we are being blamed for this. We are not an island. We are a mainland. And we have extraordinarily wide borders that are almost impossible to monitor and police,” he had said during an interview with Trinidad’s morning edition last week.
The 26 Haitians were suspected to be victims of Human Trafficking and were detained by the Guyana Police Force and subsequently placed in protective custody at the Hugo Chávez Centre since last month.
It was reported that 13 of the Haitians were first picked up by Police acting on reasonable suspicion and information, at a hotel on South Road and taken to be interviewed by agents of the Trafficking In Persons (TIP) unit.
The remainder were picked up on November 8 after being intercepted at a Police roadblock in Linden. At the time, the Police became suspicious that they were being smuggled to Brazil through the Georgetown-Lethem route.
Chief Magistrate Sherdel Issacs-Marcus had subsequently issued deportation orders after being approached by the Immigration Office.
However, the Association of Haitian Nationals in Guyana successfully approached acting Chief Justice Roxane George on December 3, to block the deportation until the constitutionality of their detention comes up for the hearing of arguments.
However, with the ongoing court case, a decision was taken to release the Haitians since it cannot be determined how long the legal proceedings will last.
Government had said last week that the Haitians had requested to be transported to an address of their choice. As such, last Thursday they were dropped off at the guest house on South Road.
Nandlall told reporters that the Haitians were entitled to six months stay in Guyana, noting that they were legally allowed to stay in Guyana for several months more.
“If they’re no longer here, not only the case ought to go but the government’s position has been vindicated,” he asserted.
Nevertheless, the Attorney General noted that with the case coming up today, the court will be informed of their disappearance and those who had petitioned for them will have to now answer to court.
