Today the Senate passed three major pieces of Immigration legislation: the Immigration Amendment Bill, The Belizean Nationality Amendment Bill and the Passports Amendments bill. The new legislation was rushed through all its stages as there is some urgency to implement the new measures, which will implement strict requirements for visa and passport scrutiny and enact heavy fines and confinement for those who break the law, form ministers to immigration officers, right down to justices of the peace.
After the meeting, Immigration Minister Godwin Hulse hosted the media at his office to discuss the stringencies of the new legislation, starting with a new nationality certificate:
Jules Vasquez Reporting
This is the stringent new nationality document that will now be required when the new law and regulations take effect in January.
This would make it impossible for events like Kim Won Hong to happen:
Hon. Godwin Hulse - Minister of Immigration
"Let's take a specific case, Won Hong Kim, who's document was signed by the Minister, and so he has a certificate as a Belizean citizen, uses that to get a passport. Let's take that exact case again. If that were to come back, that certificate would have had to have several things. It would have had to have 4 signatures to start with, that of the Director, the officer in charge, the Minister, and that of the applicant. It would have had to have the fingerprint of the applicant. It has to have the signature of the Commissioner of Supreme Court, who takes the oath. And the oath is printed on it. It has to have the person's picture embossed on it. It has to have the seal. So, to start with, if that is presented to passport section, that section now is fairly satisfied that this must be legit, but it doesn't stop there. The fact of the matter is that they have the responsibility to query that was published in the Gazette. It can only be published in the Gazette if the Committee sends the name. It's not the minister or who else; it's the Committee who is going to send the name. Once it's being published in the Gazette, it means that it has gone through all those process. That person may still have the fraud in the system, but after a committee investigation, swearing in, all that publicity, in the Gazette when he applies, in the Gazette when he's given it, Lord, man. It is a hell of a cry from where we are right now."
And while in the Senate today the opposition and the social partners asked for more deliberate and thorough review and more time to do so, Hulse says it is not a static process:
Hon. Godwin Hulse
"We never said no to any amendment. We didn't say that this is the final document. We didn't say that this is the end all. We say, 'This is a move in the right direction; let's roll!' And we make no apology for that. We need to roll, man. We can't sit and way, sit and wait, and sit and wait, for what. In the meantime, things continue, continue and continue. The international community also needs some confidence for you Mr. Rudon, and you, Mr. Jules, that when you are travelling, the US, Britain, Mexico - all of them want to know, 'What are you doing? Are you doing anything?' They love the amendments. They love the draconian amendments that they see."
The new measures go into effect next year. That is when, sources tell us that the Ministry of Immigration also intends to re organize the department and take all immigration officers out of the passport and nationality section – which would instead be broken up into sub departments and manned by second class clerks.
