Minister almost apologizes for comments

Manuel Heredia

Racial profiling has been a tactic that was once practiced by some police departments in the United States that led to costly lawsuits.  So it was shocking when a Minister of Tourism made comments interpreted as profiling while he holds a portfolio that implies the importance of cultural diversity.  Our blog on the News Five website has been inundated with reactions to the minister’s statement. In case you didn’t hear it for yourself, here’s what the minister said last week.

Manuel Heredia, Minister of Tourism    (Mar 19, 2010)

“Many of the officers that were responsible for taking control on the island, that is what they used to do. Times have changed and it is very regretful because now with the human rights situation and so there are many people that – oh you are taking away the privilege of, in particular when it happens with the Creole descent. That is the first thing that you will hear. But again, I feel that if we have to do that, we have to do it because we have to regain our community. We see many unwanted persons on the island many times and again I have said let us ask the water taxis for a manifest that will probably question the people not really in a rude way but “Where will you be working? Why did you come to San Pedro? Do you have money to sustain yourself in the meantime?” And those types of things probably will help. And that is what came out at the meeting. We have to probably recommend to cabinet that those are measures that we need to take on the island being the number one tourist destination, probably there are other alternatives that are not taken elsewhere that we supposed to take over here.”

“People might feel we want to be independent that is what they say many times. That is not the case. It’s because we are isolated from the main, many people feel that San Pedro doesn’t need any assistance, that we have everything over here. But we have always said, regardless of what, it might be true that we survive better than others, but again there are many other elements that we need to address and that takes time.”

Late this evening a release was sent from the government’s Press Office indicating that the Minister’s reference to “the people of Creole decent was made merely to highlight the fact that when the draconian crime prevention tactic of deporting potential trouble-makers was last employed on the Island, it was criticized by some for its similarity to racial profiling.”  The release goes on to say that he has certain regrets about certain comments and he would continue to advocate for fair and equal treatment for all persons. The press office release, however, said nothing about whether or not he intended to his proposal about the water taxi questionnaire to cabinet. We would like to point out that it was not the government press office that made the racial statement against creoles, so we hope before the week’s end that Heredia will issue an apology of his own, rather than the press office.