We demand respect to judgment 168-13 issued from  Dominican Republic Constitutional Court.  

The judgment 168-13 is a powerful tool to stop the illegal inmigration to Dominican Republic.

The Dominican Republic, a country which have not the very strong international influence like United States, China, Russia, France, England, Japan, Brazil, South Korea or Israel, faces some issues when their still fragile institutions make decisions, as judgment 168-2013 issued in September 2013 by Constitutional Court Dominican, which establishes a regulatory order to immigrants in Dominican Republic in compliance with mandated by the Dominican Constitution amended in 2010. This caribbean country receives all kinds of pressure, both internally and externally, from "Civil Society" led by Non-profit organization Participación Ciudadana (Participation for Citizens) and advocates of possible affected, such as the Jesuits and World Vision, and the United States, European Union and others.

If the case involves issues related to Haiti, the pressure is higher and reaches the absurd to ask the country to change or adapt its laws to make them be consistent with the interests of those nations or organizations to which the country owes explanations because governments have managed the Dominican government have mortgaged the country with loans up to build a sidewalk garden when industrial production should encourage the country to reduce dependence on foreign credit, which is a limiting quintessential sovereignties of peoples. 



Constitutional Court of the Dominican Republic

Whether we focus on the migration aspect, I have repeatedly told by my Twitter account @GEORGE_JIMENEZ4, that Dominican Republic has right to enforce its immigration laws and to regularize the status of all people who live in this land; if this really is a state and not a village or "a jungle with a flag" as dominican journalist Rufino Gil calls it country, we have to solve this problem that has affected us for years because a government begins and another ends and no one had decided to bell the cat so that the judgment of the Dominican Constitucional Court made ​​a clarion call to the authorities so they should try to end this mess.

I absolutely support the judgment 168-13 almost and the only part of it that I disagree is on the retroactive application of a review since 1929 as of today since I believe that our Constitution states in its Article 18, paragraph 2, concerning the nationality that: "Are Dominicans ... Those who enjoy dominican nationality before the entry into force of this Constitution." Therefore it is unjust dispossession of nationality for those who already have it. But for others, the same Constitution, "Constitution of Leonel Fernández" contemplated in Article 110 Principle of Non-retroactivity of the law, which states that "The law provides and applies only to the future. Do not have a retroactive effect only when it is favorable to subjudice or serving sentences. In any case the government or the law may affect or alter the legal certainty resulting from situations established under prior law. "...

Except as regards the implementation of the judgment retroactively, I fully support the approach of the Judgment of Dominican Constitucional Court. No one before had so much courage to defend the Dominican national sovereignty as did Dominican Constitucional Court with its judgment, it will always be praised by some and by others detractada since it is very controversial. This decision left to see the petticoat of a state unable to have clear policies defining immigration status and citizenship aspects. A state that for decades remained inefficient and ineffective immigration control policy in such an extreme that it did was aggravate the problem and bring it to the extent that we have today.

I fully agree with the approach of former President of the Republic , Dr. Leonel Fernández Reyna , who has demanded respect for the judgment , indicating that you can solve the problem that has arisen with Haiti , but without disrespecting the Dominican Constitucional Court failure under premise that each nation has the right to apply its laws surrounding documentation citizens and establish legal guidelines that consider place to treat nationality. Fernandez has argued that " Now, what can be seen in the recent decision of the Constitutional Court is whether it applies retroactively or only for the future " and said that " if interpreted quite simply govern for the future , no discussion , because it is an expression of the sovereignty of the state to determine who are Dominican nationals. "

"I fully agree with the statement of the former President of the Republic, Dr. Leonel Fernandez Reyna, who has demanded respect for the judgment, indicating that you can solve the problem that has arisen with Haiti, but without disrespecting the failure of Dominican Constitucional Court under premise that each nation has the right to enforce its laws regarding documentation citizens and establish legal guidelines that consider place to treat nationality. Fernandez has argued that "Now, what can be seen in the recent decision of the Constitutional Court is whether it applies retroactively, or only for the future" and said that "if interpreted quite simply be in force for the future, no discussion, because it is an expression of the sovereignty of the state to determine who are Dominican nationals. "

"If the ruling is retroactive, then we should determine the legal status of those who have lived in the country, who have had the impression of being Dominicans, once had to Dominican documentation, and since it engenders other problems" . he stressed that "obtaining Dominican nationality by blood ties (jus solis) will depend on whether the parents are legally in the Dominican Republic."

"That the United States might not understand, because it does not apply here is another system that exists in this country. Here, by the mere fact of being born in this country, although parents are not legally documented, that creature is American. But is not it all over the world. "

Former President Leonel Fernandez declared that West Palm Beach, Florida in January 2014 to resolve the problem created by the Constitutional Court Judgment 168 is necessary for the state to recognize them Dominican Dominican nationality to all those who possess the Dominican birth certificate .

In a press release from the Associated Press signed by Matt Sedensky, Tuesday 8, it is emphasized that the former president shows a softer line than other Dominican leaders about the situation of Dominicans of foreign origin (most descent Haitian) following judgment No. 168 of the Dominican Constitucional Court.

Former dominican president Leonel Fernandez (1996-2000, 2004-2012)

Dr. Fernandez is a supporter of the view that migrant children who are issued birth certificates should be granted citizenship, "a somewhat softer than the current government position." That is, Fernandez, perhaps because expert on comparative law and international law, recognizes that the State can not take away those rights to the State and at some point, they issued documents. In this part we are in full agreement with Fernandez and do not resist. The problem is with those who acquired citizenship fraudulently, for 50 or 100 dollars. These can not be Dominican because they were based on an irregular act to acquire the right to Dominican citizenship. The sad and painful thing is that many times, the irregular acquisition of citizenship was made in open collusion with official representatives of the Dominican State. But is not surprising because it is a third world country where institutions do not work, such as the Dominican Republic.

According to Fernandez, the children of many Haitian workers were improperly Dominican birth certificates before 2010 a constitutional amendment to clarify the rules of citizenship.

"They should not have done that, but they did," Fernandez said. "We have to solve this problem, admittedly: Dominican nationality of those who already have birth certificates."

Fernandez made it clear that the Dominican Republic is not the only country that does not automatically grant citizenship to children of non-citizens.

"In the US, if someone is born on US soil, you automatically become an American citizen. There is a tendency to believe that this is carried out around the world, and that's not true. This does not happen in Switzerland, does not happen in France, not the case in Germany, does not happen in Japan; this does not happen in many parts of the world. "

Outside the forum in West Palm Beach, the court ruling drew strong criticism from a small group of Haitian-American demonstrators protesting the appearance of Fernandez. Among the protesters was Marleine Bastien, executive director of Haitian Women of Miami, who said of those facing the loss of citizenship, that "you deny them their birthright is a crime."

The report of the Forum of West Palm Beach recalls that human rights groups say the law stripped of citizenship to over 200,000 people, in large part Haitian immigrants and their descendants, who crossed the border to cut sugar cane or accepted other low-wage jobs, under contract from the state or private companies authorized by the Dominican government for hiring foreign workers. The government says the figure is only about 13,000 people of Haitian descent and 11,000 of other nationalities.

On the other hand, there are those who are against the Judgment of Dominican Constitucional Court humanitarian grounds. Such is the case of the analyst Wilfredo Lozano, who wrote for the magazine "La Lupa Without Obstacles" for editing the November 8, 2013 the following quote:

"It is true, as some argue that there is a situation of virtual statelessness affected the verdict. First, whatever the argument to them have been stripped of their national status; Second, because it is simply impossible to prove that this population is Haitian, precisely because of the irregular condition in which they find it, especially the undocumented, which has helped the state itself as a broker and employer of illegal immigration which stimulated parental input into the country under illegal conditions, which was followed by his residency for decades under the strict control precisely the state in the world of batey, a kind of apartheid space organized by the plantations under the protection and supervision of the same state. "

But ask the State to continue assuming as Dominicans who are not, either because they acquired fraudulently or irregularly nationality, or because they are ineligible to possess, is not correct. I agree with raising the dominican diplomatic Flavio Dario Espinal, who also wrote an article for the aforementioned magazine on the same day which stated that "The controversy surrounding this decision will continue for a long time and its legal and political implications are impossible to predict in this time. "

In particular, a server fully supports, again, the judgment of the Dominican Constitucional Court, considering it as the best instrument of safeguarding national sovereignty that the authorities have taken our country to prevent some foreign interests that have looted us since 1492 when "discovered" the island to take our gold which we changed it for miserable mirrors; those who had to sublevarséles Bravo and undervalued Enriquillo to not end up killing the few Taino we were in 1519; Catholicism imposed on us and the most backward mentality of medieval Europe; we have topped in 1586 with the sacking of the English privateer Francis Drake; they made us lose almost a third of the island by the stupid "devastations Osorio" ordered by King Philip III; which we slaughtered hundreds of compatriots in 1805 during the removal of Dessalines; that we closed the University of Santo Domingo, the first in America in 1822, after the assault Boyer; conspired to annex us to Spain in 1861 and then tried to annex to France and take off Samana Bay for 99 years; we invaded for 8 years from 1916; who supported the tyrant Trujillo as he pressed the Dominican people and annihilated the Mirabal sisters; we stripped a good president as Bosch by a coup in 1963 under the absurd excuse that it was communist coup orchestrated by the draconian Dominican Catholic Church, with Father Garcia Laútico head; that they re-invaded in 1965 leaving lives of more than 3000 Dominicans, where despite losses rise as the "David of the Caribbean" and the same is now the gold open pit mine in the world's largest with impunity lead (the Old Town Cotuí) and nickel Bonao; who want plunder Loma Miranada and have always wanted to fuse the island to drive us over the burden of Haiti, because it is a failed state, and therefore a very heavy bundle with anyone you want to load, those who want us to continue removing what little we have left in this paradise terroncito that if it had been better managed by the parasitic and useless Dominican political class, was one of the happiest countries in the world. And really happy record, that happend recently elected as the second happiest country, which is not true of all falsehood and is, moreover, a mockery and an insult to the thinking minds in the country, as a country with appalling service of electricity and drinking water, which only invests 1.3% of GDP on health, with 42% of the population without social security, with 73% of pensions under $125 and a very poor quality in education, however they have blinded us with their religious nonexistent paradise offers a postmortem and more "allantados" having us oligarchs media manipulation to which we are subjected by the silence of clean papeletazos press, may not be as happy as saying that study, we respect, but to share anything.

He said the January 9, 2014 the former Secretary of the Dominican Armed Forces, retired General Ramiro Matos Gonzalez, that if the judgment of the Constitutional Court's 168-13 Dominican nationality is not met, the country is heading for its absence as Republic for there is a plan to merge the home of Duarte with that of Toussaint Louverture.

Do not allow it. We made it clear that a plan of this type will not happen.

Meanwhile, long live the Constitutional Court of the Dominican Republic !!!.

Deputy Abel Martínez, President of Chamber of Deputies of the Dominican Republic.

I wish the judgment 168-13 be read and reread a thousand times and opponents of it without reading reviewing walk around without legal basis and just talking to talk. And there it is delivered for the purpose of promotion policy as he has if necessary brochure delivered in fact hundreds of Abel Martinez, President of the Chamber of Deputies, but then for the sake of the motherland. Long Live to Dominican Republic!

The author is a lawyer graduated from Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo, the first in America, Social Security Technician and political analyst.