The Central Electoral Board (JCE) civil registry department has backtracked and has recognized most of the birth certificates and identity documents that had been issued by civil officials in the past, despite many of these being in violation with the long standing rule that establishes that only those born to legal residents or having at least a Dominican citizen parent are Dominican. The decision benefits around 55,000 persons, most of Haitian descent where fraud was not evidenced.
The irregularities that lead to the standstill on the birth certificates were found after in 2007 the JCE began a comprehensive review of the civil registry following pressures from Major League Baseball. MLB protested irregularities in the civil registry including fraudulent birth certificates to baseball players.
Likewise, the civil registry review was carried out after it became known that many international criminals had been taking advantage of weaknesses in the system to obtain Dominican identity.
The findings led JCE officers to describe some civil registry offices as “a marketplace.”
The investigations also showed that civil registry officials had irregularly issued Dominican birth certificates to offspring of undocumented foreigners in violation to Dominican rules that determine who is Dominican.
The rules required for legal residence as confirmed by the Supreme Court in 2005 and as outlined by the Constitutional Court Ruling 168-13 state that at least one parent must be a Dominican citizen or the parent have legal residency status.
Subsequently, Law 169-14 on the Special Regime and Naturalization and Decree 250-14 with its rules offered exceptions to the jus sanguis rule. The law established a short term special naturalization regime for people born in the Dominican Republic but who were irregularly registered in the Dominican civil registry.
In the case of the published list of beneficiaries, most of those that had been affected as a result of the review of their Dominican identification by the JCE occurred following the JCE review of the civil registry when the numerous irregularities in the issuing of documents was discovered. This created major difficulties for those who had been using the documents for years and needed new copies when the civil registry system no longer deemed their identity was legitimate.
The decision comes as part of a Medina government plan to ensure that all living in the country have legal status, including foreigners and their offspring.
The list of beneficiaries of Law 169-14 can be found at: