ARTICLE - OFFICIALS SUBMIT PASSPORTS

MINISTER AND SECRETARIES OF STATE HAVE SUBMITTED THEIR PASSPORTS
(Haiti Libre) -

Joseph Lambert, President of the Senate Committee responsible for verifying the nationality of members of Government, has indicated yesterday Thursday that on the evening of Wednesday "...there was an agreement with the President of the Senate, who requested that the Minister responsible for relations with Parliament [Ralph Ricardo Théano] can form a bridge and deposit all the documents that we find useful [to avoid the displacement of all the Ministers and Secretaries of State]. Despite everything, some ministers and Secretary of States chose to appear personally before the Commission [...]"

Ralph Ricardo Théano, declared "...everybody has submitted his passports in accordance with the requirement of the Senate, with the exception of Minister Hébert Docteur [...] the Minister of Environment, the Minister of Social Affairs and the Secretary of State, Ms. Gourgue who are on a mission abroad [...] It was agreed with the Commission that as soon as they return they will submit their documents [...] All the ministers decided in consultation to come and submit their documents, because we are adults..."

Senator Lambert wished to add that "the Commission will arrange to work rapidly on all the documents with great efficiency and reliability, in order to recover as quickly as possible the documents of certain Ministers and Secretaries of States who have to go on missions abroad [...]"; also adding that, "the commission continues to receive information, coming from different sources [...] We consider everything that appears on the Internet.... with a few exceptions. It is imperative that we analyze this data in depth. We can also say, that at the executive level of emigration and immigration [...] there are certain documents that have been burned [...], not accidentally, but it was voluntarily that they have burned them, and on this basis we are not in measure to say [...] how long and to what limit a document may remain in the office of immigration [...] We need to clarify the situation to avoid all suspicion, all doubts and perhaps shed light on what we can... 'It's a mysterious thing,' as Steeven Benoît said... We convened the Minister of the Interior in this regard, Tuesday, February 28..."

It is not possible that Senator Benoît and Lambert have ignored the public statements made by Roland Chavannes, the Director General of the office of Immigration, on these "mysterious" burnt documents, who had indicated on February 10, "The destruction this week by the immigration office of a set of documents has nothing to do with the investigation surrounding the nationality of the official dignitaries of the State [...] All the information contained in these documents that were burned, are stored on the computer system," and rejecting all suspicion generated by a strictly administrative decision.

Moreover, if as mentioned by Senator Lambert, the Internet becomes for the Commission "a source of information that must be analyzed in depth," the nationality saga, is likely to continue for much longer. It would be appreciated that our Senators, who proclaimed loudly, wanting to work seriously,... do so, with the authorities and official bodies, rather than wasting time and taxpayer money on rumors of the web...

Meanwhile, Rosny Desroches, the Executive Director of the Civil Society Initiative, deplored the refusal of the President of the Republic to cooperate in the nationality investigation [...] "The record of the nationality of members of the government being of national importance, it should be treated with utmost seriousness."

For its part, the Head of State explained that "It is a false issue, a false crisis, this case relating to my nationality;" stating that at the inauguration of the office of Immigration and Emigration in the city of Les Cayes, on January 20, "the inspector gave a demonstration [of the computer system] with my name to get my file. Everything had appeared on the screen, including my boarding passes, and more than twenty-five passports issued by the department."