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Dekada mulls meeting with Senate staffers
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Posted on Mar 21 2005
The Dekada movement said it would arrange for a possible meeting with former Office of Insular Affairs director Allen Stayman and his co-staffers at the U.S. Senate, who are scheduled for a fact-finding mission in the CNMI this week.
Dekada lawyer Stephen Woodruff noted that Stayman was very vocal about federalization of minimum wage and immigration policies in the CNMI during the latter’s stint with the OIA during the Clinton administration.
Woodruff clarified, though, that Dekada would not lobby for federalization.
“It is not Dekada’s position that the federal government should take over here,” he said, explaining that Dekada’s intention is to obtain for its members improved immigration status through long-term residency.
Dekada is composed of alien workers who have lawfully resided in the Commonwealth for at least five consecutive years. Its members have reached at least 3,000, some of whom have children who are U.S. citizens.
Federal immigration rules allow aliens lawfully living in the United States for five consecutive years to apply for permanent residency status. The group will ask the U.S. Congress to pass a legislation that will grant its members U.S. permanent residency status.
Dekada president Bonifacio Sagana said the group has already sent information about the movement to some U.S. congressmen. He said the group’s representatives would soon fly to Washington D.C. to lobby before the U.S. Congress for permanent residency status for its members.
Sagana urged those who earlier signed up for the movement but did not complete their membership to join the group. He said that Dekada would seek legislative relief to improve its members’ immigration status, and that that group has no plan yet to seek judicial relief.
