EDITOR, The Tribune

MY recent experience in trying to renew an e-passport for my juvenile daughter has rendered me almost ashamed to be a Bahamian.

I applied for this passport renewal on March 23 and was given a pick-up date of May 5. Based on what I was hearing, I decided to give the passport office an extra month, and went back on June 6 at 8am.

Immediately I found myself no.41 on a line of persons who had come to pick up their passports. Tempted to leave, I decided to remain when I discovered that the no.1 person had arrived at 5am.

We were out in the elements awaiting the opening of the office at 8.30.Thankfully, at about 8.20, office personnel ushered in the elderly, the visually pregnant and those with very young children. Then they started allowing in 10 persons at a time. I eventually got inside the building and after about one hour was told that my daughter’s passport was not ready and I should return to pick it up the week of June 27.

I reported back to the passport office on June 29 at 7.30am and this time found myself at no.15 on the line. Every time I had to face that line, I found it to be dehumanising. Bahamian citizens lining up for hours outside under the blazing summer sun just to pick up a passport.

By now I had been noticing that at all hours of the day when I passed this place, there were large numbers of persons outside on that hellish line.

But I digress. I got inside at about 9.15am. Shortly afterwards the skies opened up and the rain poured down on about 70 men, women and children outside. Although I was on the inside, I was traumatised by this and actually felt guilty that while I was enjoying air-conditioned comfort, my fellow citizens were outside getting soaked to their underwear because after being on that line for hours, they did not want to lose their position by leaving to seek shelter.

After waiting for about an hour and a quarter, I was told that once again the passport was not ready and I should return on July 1.

On leaving the building I observed that the rain had abated and the sun was now out in full blaze, drying off the people that the rain had soaked shortly before. You would imagine that only cattle are treated like that; however, the reality is that unbelievably this is what is happening to Bahamians in 2016, some 43 years after independence.

We have been issuing passports since 1973 and we are well aware of the summer rush. It should not take a rocket scientist to figure out that if 120 persons are going to show up at any one point and you only have indoor accommodation for 40 then you need to re-locate.   

Getting back to my story, I returned on July 1, this time with a firm determination that I was going to get that renewed passport that day at all cost. I got there early again, faced the line again, eventually got inside and was eventually advised that - yet again - the document was not ready.

I was given a choice to remain or to return at 1pm, when I would not have to stand outside in line. I chose the latter, and for the fourth time, the travel document was not ready. Determined to stick it out, I left the passport office with my daughter’s passport at 6.40pm that day.

On one of the days when I was making those time-wasting trips to the passport office, I conversed with a gentleman who told me that his Jamaican wife recently took a three-day trip to her homeland and returned with her renewed passport. Jamaica is a country of four million people. Our population is less than 400,000.

Why can’t we get even close to the Jamaican standard in passport renewals since we love to compare ourselves with them and other Caribbean nations in so many other areas?

But it gets worse. From conversations I had with other persons during this experience, I discovered that the government is actually profiting from its own inefficiency by way of the $200 “rush” fee. If we were capable of producing or renewing passports in a timely manner in the first instance, there would be no need for a “rush” passport fee.

What is worse, many persons who paid the $200 in the interest of time after their original or subsequent pickup dates were not honoured, still did not get their documents on the promised “rush” date, and were not refunded their monies if they requested a refund. That action by the passport office, a branch of our government, is akin to the mafia. It is either extortion or stealing by reason of service. Either way, it is a terrible thing for a government agency to be doing to Bahamians.

If the manner in which our passport office operates in 2016 is indicative of the remainder of the public service, then I can easily see why 43 years post-Independence this country is no better off that it actually is. All of our governments should hang their collective heads in shame and disgrace. We change governments, but the systems do not change.

This horrific experience is just one of several reasons why I did not celebrate Independence this year.

ROOSEVELT “WELLY” FORBES

Nassau,

July 11, 2016.