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MANY VENEZUELANS IN Ireland with expired passports are living in a state of limbo, unable to travel because of a printing shortage in their country.
Over the past year, thousands of emigrated Venezuelans across the world have been waiting for renewed passports, trapped in a situation that has put their visas at risk and that has stopped them from travelling.
Venezuela’s socialist president Nicolás Maduro has been in office since 2013. His government has driven the country into what many are calling a humanitarian crisis. Dozens have died in protests in the capital of Caracas and food supplies have become scarce. Many emigrated Venezuelans are terrified of returning home.
In October, Maduro signed emergency legislation that permitted the extension of expired Venezuelan passports by two years, alleging that the delay in passports being issued was because of a shortage of paper at the national passport agency.
[image alt="Venezuela: Protest Against Nicolas Maduro Government in Caracas" src="http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2018/01/venezuela-protest-against-nicolas-maduro-government-in-caracas-296x197.jpg" width="296" height="197" credit-source="SIPA%20USA%2FPA%20Images" caption="Protesters%20clash%20with%20police%20during%20a%20demonstration%20to%20the%20streets%20of%20Caracas%2C%20Venezuela" class="alignnone" /end]
The two-year extension, which can be obtained from any Venezuelan embassy in Europe (of which there are none in Ireland), allows expired passports to remain valid for visa purposes.
However, Venezuelans have expressed their anger, fear and uncertainty surrounding the conditions of this new extension.
One Venezuelan woman living in Galway, Dayana Maltese, told TheJournal.ie while she has gained the status of an Irish citizen, her boyfriend Antonio applied for a passport last May and has yet to receive a new one.
To obtain the two-year extension, Antonio would have to travel to one of the embassies in France, Belgium or Germany. He cannot do this because his passport has expired since May.
To be able to travel to one of the embassies in Europe to obtain the two-year extension, Venezuelans in Ireland must do so before their passports expire. Of course, this poses a significant problem for those whose passports expired before the announcement of the extension in October.
There is also another grave implication for Antonio if he decided to opt for the extension – that application would cancel out his current application for a new passport.
“If you accept the extension, your whole process will be cancelled. You won’t get a refund for your passport and you’ll still have to pay the fee for your extension. It’s crazy, it’s like you’re paying double,” Maltese told TheJournal.ie.
Those who spoke to TheJournal.ie said they don’t feel comfortable applying for the extension from the Embassy as it will prevent them from obtaining a valid passport.
Another Venezuelan living in Ireland, Rossana, told TheJournal.ie: “It’s my right to have my passport. It’s my right to travel, to be a normal person and I don’t have that. I deserve a normal passport.”
Rossana’s passport has been expired since May 2017. She applied for a new one on 7 January 2017 and has yet to obtain it.
She explained that in order to get the two-year extension, there must be space within the expired passport for a stamp from the Embassy (stamps may not be covered by extra ones). Of course, as many Venezuelan expired passports have been used to travel and obtain visas for years, most don’t have much, if any, space left for stamps. Rossana hasn’t applied for a two-year extension for this reason.
“If you want to travel, you also have to apply in Ireland for a re-entry visa, which would take another page of your passport. I’ve been out of Venezuela for four and a half years, so my passport is completely full. You’re very limited, you need a new passport,” Rossana said.
Travel restrictions
Those who aren’t in a position to obtain a two-year extension to their passport, and even those who have obtained the extension, have been left in a situation where they are fearful of, or unable to travel out of Ireland.
While Maduro’s government has said that the extension allows Venezuelans to travel with expired passports, some have said they are still afraid of doing so, for fear of what other nations’ immigration offices will make of expired passports.
Those who have not received the two-year extension are not permitted to travel.
[image alt="VENEZUELA-CARACAS-ELECTIONS" src="http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2018/01/venezuela-caracas-elections-296x201.jpg" width="296" height="201" credit-source="Xinhua%20News%20Agency%2FPA%20Images" caption="Venezuelan%20president%20Nicol%C3%A1s%20Maduro" class="alignnone" /end]
“We had tickets to go to New York on holidays because my family are there as well, but we had to cancel,” Maltese said.
“It is very upsetting because you lose your money, your plans and your holiday. It was the same for our holiday last August, we couldn’t take our yearly holiday because we had no passport,” she said.
Rossana is married to an Irishman, which has made her situation slightly different than others. Because she is married to an EU citizen, she is currently permitted to apply for a travel pass for €180. However, she said she’s too afraid to do so.
“I wouldn’t be comfortable to travel with a travel pass when my Venezuelan passport is expired. I feel afraid to do that,” Rossana told TheJournal.ie.
I wanted to go home this Christmas to be with my parents. I haven’t seen them in three years, but I simply couldn’t because I don’t have a passport.
Alongside the travel implications, both Rossana and Maltese said that the expired passports have caused an array of other issues, such as trying to secure a job.
“I’m applying for my mortgage, for example, and if you give your passport as ID it’s expired and nobody understands that,” Rossana said.
“I’m not allowed to travel to go home to see my family. I’m just stuck here in Ireland.”
Other issues with expired passports
Between the mismanagement of Venezuela’s economy and the steep fall in oil prices, the government has a severe cash flow issue. Because of this, a goods shortage is at crisis level as the country dives deeper into chaos every day.
A lack of money has led to food shortages. Oftentimes, basic food supplies don’t get delivered to stores and when they do, they’re scarce. Venezuelans are left with no choice but to queue from the early hours of the morning before stores open in an attempt to get to the supplies before they run out. This has been a major driving force behind the dozens of protests that have taken place in the country in recent months.
Because of this situation, Venezuelans across the world are terrified of returning home and bank on their valid visa to keep them in their new country of residence.
Giving a glimpse into life in Venezuela, Maltese said: “My whole family had money before but now it’s very difficult. They have lost weight, I can see that they’re skinny and just bones.
“I have a cousin who has cancer and he can’t find treatment. The whole family is suffering because you know you can lose someone because of not having the treatment.”
It’s a very serious humanitarian crisis.
[image alt="Crisis in Venezuela" src="http://cdn.thejournal.ie/media/2018/01/crisis-in-venezuela-4-296x197.jpg" width="296" height="197" credit-source="PA%20Images" caption="Numerous%20people%20wait%20in%20line%20in%20front%20of%20a%20grocery%20store%20in%20Caracas%2C%20Venezuela" class="alignnone" /end]
The Venezuelans who spoke to TheJournal.ie said that the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service (INIS) has been somewhat understanding of those who are not in a position to extend their passports by two years, and have offered some a six-month extension to the validity of their visas – a Garda Immigration Card.
The six-month Garda Immigration Card extension still does not, however, allow Venezuelans to travel, unless they have a valid passport.
In a statement to TheJournal.ie, the Department of Justice said: “The Department will adopt a case-by-case position as far as renewal of registration is concerned, on the basis that persons with Venezuelan passports are already legally present here would have a Garda Immigration Card so that we would be able to verify identity.
“To the best of our knowledge, we have not been presented with anyone at registration with a difficulty.”
Maltese said: “We wrote to immigration in Dublin about our problems. They sent us a letter to say they would give us an extension for six months, but that it’s up to your government to have your papers up to date.”
Antonio, Maltese’s partner, received a letter from An Garda Síochána following his correspondence with INIS, which has been seen by TheJournal.ie.
It read:
You are required by Section 9(2) of the Immigration Act 2004 to, inter alia, produce a passport or other document by an authority recognised by the Irish Government establishing your identity and nationality.
You are required to make reasonable and formal efforts to obtain a National passport and to show that it has been formally and unreasonably refused. The provision of original correspondence from the relevant Consular Authority is an essential component in the provision of evidence of your application
However, you can be registered with An Garda Síochána for a period of six months to allow you to obtain your National passport.
Antonio received a letter from the Venezuelan embassy to confirm that he had applied for a passport on 16 May 2017.
The letter also confirmed that the passport is issued in Venezuela but it has not yet arrived at the Consular Office.
Like others who have gone through this process, his six-month Garda Immigration Card extension was then granted.
However, there is no certainty to when the printing backlog in Venezuela will be resolved and it remains unclear if the passport will reach the embassy within the six month period.
“The situation is really out of hand. It’s worse than what we ever thought it could be,” Maltese said.
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I’m generally not a green freaky type but I do value life in its entirety, no, not vegan either lol. This, to me, is senseless waste of life, leading to extinction of life forms, and for what. It’s not like it’s helping world hunger. It’s so very sad and those responsible should feel great shame.
@Anna Carr: “and for what”? it makes money for for people and makes the big co-ops lots of money.
@Anna Carr: genuine question but why do Irish people see green people as freaks or vegans as a joke?
@Lad: I’m not sure about green, but the opinion about vegans, I dare say it’s the inability to grasp a concept differing from what they and their parents grew up with. Possibly also the refusal to even consider in the slightest the thought of learning new skills and change the way of earning income. Who knows. I’m often thinking about a story my grandmother told me when I was young.
A man had trained as an apple picker and for 20 years made a good living reaching up into the trees harvesting apples. Then the orchard burned down due to a terrible wildfire and work was only available in the neighbouring town, and only as a potato harvester. The man refused the work because after 20 years of reaching up into the apple trees, he didn’t want to learn how to bend down to pick up potatoes. And so he got no work and died of hunger.
The ability to look towards the future, to learn skills that are in demand and that actually have a future, is what I often see totally lacking in people here sadly. So much about a mind set speculation.
As to the article, I’m as usual totally amazed at the short sightedness of everybody involved. Instead of looking over the brim of the bowl and seeing the whole (our seas and oceans on this planet), talk is about this little part of it. If I were sarcastic, I would say, fear not, for in a small decade the oceans will be dead zones, there’ll be no fish to catch, and the air quality on our planet will be so bad that survival will be questionable. Yes, the oceans are a larger oxygen provider than the rain forests. Everyone intelligent enough to have seen Seaspiracy et al. and understood what was aid and shown, knows the solution to the problem. Nobody can do everything, but everybody can do something.
Opinions are like noses. Everybody has one. And that’s my opinion. No need for verbal abuse if you have a different one.
The pillaging of the sea continues unabated.
The biggest virus on this planet is the human race.
@Patrick Corr: That’s an insult to viruses. They normally don’t kill their host.
@Padraig Kavanagh: LOL I admit I must agree with you ;)
Seaspriacy a must watch on Netflix, very factual about sea vessels and the damage they cause the sea life.
@Sadie b: agree seaspiracy is a documentary everybody needs to see urgently! A revolution is needed before we destroy the oceans.
@Sadie b: if the oceans die then we die. Industrial fishing the biggest polluter on the planet and speeding up the path to self destruction. Agree seaspiracy is a must watch
@MB: No revolution needed, just an amending of eating habits.
@Sadie b: I watched Seaspiracy and think each individual section should be addressed separately. Below is a view by Ray Holborn who is respected internationally by many on both sides of the debate.
@Brendan Barry: Ray Hilborn has a vested interest and his points are so totally out of date and off the mark, I doubt anybody with an open mind would agree with him. The argument of animals being killed in crop farming has been refuted years ago due to it’s incorrect relation as proven by scientific studies and evidence. And he really misses the mark when he talks about well managed fisheries. What Seaspiracy is showing (amongst other things) is the devastating impact of the gigantic fishing fleets. The native people doing coastal fishing for their dinner in Africa or in the Pacific are certainly no threat to the oceans.
What Hilborn totally ignores is the point of unnecessary and intentional suffering and killing. Just saying.
A very interesting but depressing report. So we are told to lay off criticising the fishermen for the vast numbers of creatures suffering as by-catches as they will stop reporting them. Who’s to say they are reporting accurately anyway? The figures could be much greater and we will only know when endangered species have disapeared altogether. Nobody is there to see what is actually happening on these boats. I fear that like so much legislation meant to protect our struggling planet new regulations will be either ignored or go unenforced.
@Pat Forster: perhaps cameras on every vessel in the Irish Sea, accessible by a monitoring agency? It would be a huge operation, but to allow these guys do what they want and self report is crazy!
@Padraig O’M: Absolutely not! I’d imagine a large amount of super trawlers have cameras on board and there I can agree that companies should be obliged to show evidence that they observe practise on board their vessels and ensure it’s moral. There are fishermen who do not cause harm at all to the environment and entire communities who rely on people like these hardworking people of goodwill for fish. Small trawlers operated by father and son or whatever should not be effectively stalked by the government or any agency. That would also cost millions for the infrastructure alone and monitoring each vessel would require hundreds of staff. What is essential is that the European Union’s opinion on what our national territorial waters are is not listened to. The navy should not have ships stuck in dry dock half of the year because of poor pay. The pay must be increased so that our naval officers can protect Irish waters from foreign super trawlers, who probably aren’t familiar in the first with Irish maritime law.
We have a fantast fisheries here and we allow it to be raped and pillaged by foreign fishermen. And I know people will say we get money from the eu. Money cant be eaten. We giving future generations food away purely out of greed
The EU have only just begun trawling our waters. #KillingUsSlowly
Good to hear of better monitoring of discards. I’d like the idea of cameras on every shipping vessel and personally think a government representative should be on every trawler to document all activities. Be nice if we could start being more proactive with our great sea resource.
The answer is quite simple – so simple in fact that ye will all reject it in an attempt to keep the status quo.
Stop abusing animals – all animals – if you love your dog/cat then love chickens/cows/pigs.
You can look down on Vegans all you like but that is the plain and simple path – Save Lives – Go Vegan
The average person feels very helpless in the face of all this .We know that the ocean will eventually be destroyed by pollution ,plastic, over fishing etc etc bu what to do .And indeed by all accounts any attempt to challenge the status quo brings swift reprisals .
DON’T EAT FISH .and never will again after seeing Seaspiracy
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