El Caribe newspaper is today reporting that 65,049 individuals of Haitian ancestry had willingly self-deported from the Dominican Republic in the just the past two months alone.
Though Dominican authorities were offering bus services and cargo transport services to any Haitian national who wanted to willingly relocate to Haiti, only 878 persons utilized that service.
The shocking exodus figures coincide with news today, reported in Diario Libre, that the salaries of construction workers had increased by 15.5%. A lot of construction work in the Dominican Republic has traditionally been carried out by Haitian laborers, meaning that the effects of the mass migration are already being felt throughout Dominican society.
According to figures released by the Dominican Department of Immigration, over 15,000 of the individuals who self-deported were minors.
The current mass movement of individuals of Haitian ancestry from the Dominican Republic follows the end of the enrollment period for a legal-status "normalization plan" implemented by the Dominican government, a plan criticized internationally for depriving individuals of Haitian ancestry from Dominican citizenship. Many Haitians are self-deporting with their possessions in the hope of avoiding a mass deportation that would see them deprived of all their belongings.
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| elnuevoherald |
During previous mass deportations, many Haitians were forced to leave their possessions behind; possessions which would eventually be appropriated by mobs.
Though 65,000 individuals have left through legal border crossings, it is not certain how many have left through unofficial means. Just recently, Listin Diario reported on Emmanuel Azuma, a Haitian national who was denied entry into Haiti by Haitian authorities, but simply waited until nightfall and crossed through a river.
It is very likely that the number of individuals who have left the Dominican Republic in the past two months far exceeds the official figure of: 65,000.
