MIAMI, United States. – The director of the Department of Immigration of the Government of the Bahamas, Keturah Ferguson, assured this Thursday that the Executive of her country has spent more than 2.3 million dollars in the repatriation of migrants, mostly Cubans and Haitians, only in what so far this year, according to the EFE report.
“It costs approximately $400 per person to repatriate to Haiti and $305 per person to Cuba,” Ferguson told a news conference.
The official specified that 1.6 million dollars had been disbursed in repatriations between January and June. Expenditures in recent months have been $30,268 (July), $703,000 (August), and $32,200 (September to early October).
Likewise, the director of the Immigration Department revealed that the Bahamian government had spent 2.2 million dollars on repatriations in 2018; 1.6 million in 2019; 1.3 million in 2020; and 2.4 million in 2021.
So far in 2022 (as of October 2), Bahamian authorities have detained 2,804 migrants, including 519 Cubans and 1,916 Haitians, which exceeds the number of arrests in the last three years.
In June of this year, The attorney general of the Bahamas, Ryan Pinder, assured that the numbers of migrants arriving on the coast of his country, particularly Cubans, were “through the roof,” according to the newspaper’s report. TheTribune.
“We are seeing a significant number of Cuban immigrants coming in and we believe we need to redeploy Immigration officers throughout the archipelago to better combat this,” he said.
“Our number of illegal immigrants, seizures and repatriations is through the roof; frankly much higher than we’ve seen before, so this is an effort to try to mitigate illegal migration,” he added.
Bahamas it is not the only Caribbean territory that has had to take emergency measures due to the wave of Cuban migrants.
At the end of April of this year, the Customs and Border Control Service (CBC) of the Cayman Islands activated a contingency plan given the massive arrival of migrants – including many Cubans – on the coast of Cayman Brac, according to the media. Cayman Marl Road.
Currently, Cuba is experiencing a migratory exodus that has already surpassed the Mariel crisis. Weekly, dozens of Cuban rafters they take to the sea in an attempt to reach the shores of Florida. Most of them are intercepted by US authorities and returned to the Island.
However, others end up in territories far from the United States, not counting those who disappear and even die on the high seas.
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