Residents Encounter Illegal Migrants on Monday, and say hundreds landed undetected  

By Deandrea Hamilton

Editor

#TurksandCaicos, September 2, 2023 – One woman says she encountered an entire family tucked away in bushes near the Millennium Heights subdivision around 7 a.m. Monday morning; they were asking for food and help.

Another, a man, posted his experience on Facebook, capturing what he says was happening in Blue Hills.

“This is the fourth group for the morning y’all.  The fourth group.  Woman, woman, man and everybody is dressed in something dark.  Long line of people.  Look at the long line of people.  Where the Police is?  Where the Immigration office is?  They are only there when it’s time to harass Turks Island people.  Our government need to stop harassing us and fight the real battle.  This why our country getting out of control, because we don’t know who is here and these people come for money and they come for it anyway necessary, they could obtain that.”

The cell phone video showed, just as he said, a line of suspected illegal migrants marching behind one person, who appeared to be the pied piper, leading the group to only God knows where.

To many Turks and Caicos citizens, this is a clear and present danger which is unchecked by authorities.

It would be days before the Police make a statement related to a separate illegal landing; that one on Tuesday with an estimated 200 aboard.

The influx of illegal migrants to the country, mostly from embattled and nearby Haiti is a longstanding issue.  It was reported by residents that as many as two vessels got pass the radar between Saturday August 26 and Sunday August 27.

In this instance, shared on Monday August 28, 2023, the individuals appear to have missed radar detection to make landfall in the northwestern end of the island of Provo.