Former Progressive Liberal Party MP Phillip Galanis has heavily criticized the government’s deadline threat for all irregular migrants to leave the country by year-end.
His statements came while appearing as a guest on the Love 97 Radio Program “On Point”.
“First of all it is unchristian, bad policy and it really does not make a whole lot of sense and the Prime Minister needs to clarify what he meant by that, there has to be more to come.
“If you’re saying come January 1st we’re going to get rid of all the illegal persons that are here, how many families are we going to dislodge, how many people are stateless in this country?
“As far as those persons that have applied we need to clear the deck and close the files, either you accept or deny them,” said Galanis.
His statements came in response to Dr. Minnis’ ultimatum that people living in the country illegally must get out by December 31 or be arrested and deported.
On Friday Immigration Minister Brent Symonette insisted that the deadline threat for all irregular migrants to leave the country by year-end only sounded “draconian,” but will be carried out as “humanely and caring” as possible.
However, the Immigration minister did clarify that Dr. Hubert Minnis’ deadline did not represent an amnesty for persons seeking to enter the country illegally – a point raised by Opposition senator Fred Mitchell yesterday.
Mr. Symonette said officials were still in talks over how they would tackle the backlog of applications for citizenship and permanent residency in the department of immigration.
He noted that application renewals “may suffer” as the department prioritizes the processing of new applications ahead of the December 31 deadline.
