It was originally only to last for a few months - but the immigration amnesty program has seen some delays which have pushed the end date from September 2023 to March 2024. That means those that are awaiting permanent resident cards were in danger of being terminated from their jobs, since they did not reapply for their Temporary Employment Permits.
This prompted the IOM Belize to reach out to the Ministry of Immigration for them to allow migrants with a white receipt to be able to use that until the end of the amnesty process.
Yesterday, the Ministries of Immigration and Labor issued a press release, stating that the receipt now allows migrants to remain and work in Belize.
Today, the head of office of IOM Belize explained that they're glad that the government approved their request.
Diana Locke, Head Of Office, IOM Belize
"In mid October, we began getting, or early October, we began getting calls from migrants who'd applied in the amnesty process about the fact that they might be using their jobs or they were experiencing difficulties because their TEPs had run out. The main concern was they were being let go, people were about to lose their jobs and because they were waiting for the approval for their amnesty. After doing a bit of research and gathering information, we decided to write to Minister Courtenay to ask, as Minister of Immigration, to ask for a special consideration along with his colleagues at labor to see
whether or not migrants who had applied in the amnesty could be allow to work using the white receipt. The white receipt signifies that you have completed the entire application process and everything is in order. So those persons who still have yellow receipts still have to make contact with the amnesty office because it means that their application is not complete so if you have a yellow receipt, it needs to changed out or you're not going to be in the process. Based on that we asked could they allow temporarily, because this is not the norm for them to allow persons to work, it is outside of these individual's control, the delays that are occurring at this point, and so it took them a while and they I guess considered it and we're very happy now to see the press release come out approving that they are able to work."
Courtney Menzies:
"How do you go about ensuring that the people who were already let go or who are in trouble of being let go that they are aware of this, and that their employers are also aware of it?"
Diana Locke, Head Of Office, IOM Belize
"As soon as we got the press release, we started sharing it with the persons who contacted us, be it industries, because in the south, we got calls from the industries, from banana, so we shared it with them, all of our migrant centers, we're going to be translating it into Spanish, an official translation into Spanish and posting it on our Facebook. We know that migrants do a lot of communication through Facebook and so we are going to make certain that we get it out there, we're sharing with all of our partners, everybody, we've already started just sending it out so that people could be aware of what's happening. Everyone who has contacted me personally, I've already sent it to them."
"As I understand it, I think the Amnesty office has pretty much finished everything, most of the significant portion of what they need to do, it's really at the police vetting stage, that's where, as I understand it, most of the files have been sent there and they're waiting for them to come back from there."
Following the vetting process, there will be another process at the amnesty office for verification and recommendation for approval. Locke also noted that those with yellow receipts should visit the amnesty office in Belmopan, since it means their application is incomplete.
