The New York Times recently highlighted the story of a young Dominican baseball player, Ángel Luis Joseph, who had been offered a contract by the San Francisco Giants. Sadly he lost this contract because the Dominican civil registry office refused to give him an official copy of his birth certificate, without which he could not get a passport or US visa. The Dominican civil registry office said that his documents are "under investigation" because his parents are Haitian. Ángel Luis was born in the Dominican Republic and was issued a Dominican birth certificate by a Dominican registry office. He has grown up speaking Spanish, has attended Dominican schools, and has never been to Haiti.
When I visited the Dominican Republic earlier this month I met with Ángel Luis and 24 other people in his situation (and heard of hundreds more cases). All of these people are unable to obtain official copies of their documents because of "investigations" arising from them having Haitian-sounding surnames. These people could not graduate from school, enter university, obtain a passport, get married, or register the births of their children.
The New York Times article was picked up by a Dominican newspaper - Diario Libre, and it has generated significant interest. Diario Libre's website now has 10 pages of comments on the article that have been posted by members of the Dominican public. Aware that this is a neuralgic issue in the Dominican Republic, I was not surprised to see some knee-jerk reactions that are disturbingly anti-Haitian. But I was struck by how many Dominicans had written in expressing concern for this young man and hoping for a resolution of this issue for him and for others in his situation.
Many people also pointed to the fact that Dominican migrants overseas are often treated badly, and argued that the Dominican Republic was simply enforcing its migration laws as other countries do. Although it is correct that every country has the right to enforce its own migration laws, these people were misinformed about the Dominican Republic's own laws. Until 2004, children of non-legal residents were given citizenship under Dominican law. However, a new "Migration Law" was passed in 2004 that re-interpreted the Dominican Constitution as granting citizenship to people born on Dominican soil only if their parents are legal residents. The country is applying this law retroactively to people born before this law came into force -- a violation of international and Dominican law. Some people pointed out that my own country, the UK, has changed its nationality laws to require that at least one parent of a child born in the UK is legally resident for the child to acquire British nationality. This is true, but the UK does not apply this new law to people born before the law changed. UK does not apply this new law to people born before the law changed.
Ángel Luis has now been offered a contract by the Cleveland Indians. But if he cannot get a passport he will lose this contract, too. Let's hope that the Dominican government gives him an official copy of his birth certificate this time.
--Melanie Teff
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
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