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Here's what the CEO told KREM news after the very lively meeting:

Edmund Zuniga, CEO - Ministry of Immigration
"We came to talk to them and hear what their immigration issues are and to share with them some of the regulations and what the requirements are in order to be able to fulfil the requirements for whatever it is that they need. Many of the people spoke about having lodge applications and they haven't had feedback and so what we have done is to encourage them to visit us again in Belmopan. Over the last few years we've kinda change our processes and so we would want to see them again, be able to pull out their files and see what is was that stopped their process from going through."

Reporter
"Mr. Arzu indicated that there is no longer a backlog as it relates to nationalities. He is saying that since 2014 going back to that time there was a backlog. Now its current, so why is it that we've seen this large amount of people here a lot of them indicating that they are not getting any feedback. What could have gone wrong there?"

Edmund Zuniga, CEO - Ministry of Immigration
"There are couple things - I think that some point in the past whenever our offices couldn't get in touch with individuals they would close their files and put them away and forget about those files. We've also gone through now an exercise where we've converted files for nationality in particular for persons who applied for citizenship from Guatemala and you know we no longer issue citizenship to Guatemalans and so we've converted their files to permanent residence applications, so we need those people to come in so we can update the new file for permanent residence and be able to issue."

Reporter
"Now, it is an election year and when this last happened in 2012, immigration and nationality officials admitted that in the senate inquiry that steps were missed, what guarantees are there to Belizean public that this will not happen again?"

Edmund Zuniga, CEO - Ministry of Immigration
"Oh no, things have changed considerably since that time. The law was amended and there is now a nationality scrutinizing committee and that committee is a mixed committee of public/private sector people. The private sector people's job is to see that we do what we are supposed to do. Secondly, every persons who applies for citizenship that application is published in the gazette, so that everybody knows who is applying and when it is approved and the person is granted citizenship, that grant is also published in the gazette."

Reporter
"In terms of how long the process takes from the time someone applies has all their documentation on order, how long should they reasonable expect this to take?"

Edmund Zuniga, CEO - Ministry of Immigration
"Well we are getting better, actually the last time the nationality scrutinizing committee met we were looking at applications for 2018. There may have been 1-2 for 2019, so the timeline is now I would say 8 months to a year and the person should be able to get some results."

Reporter
"Now, you have accommodated the standard bearer for Lake I and this is something thats been greatly criticized by a large number of the Belizean population and even the minister herself seems to have had a double view and probably she took back what she has initially stated to Channel 5 and then what she told Channel 7 was in a sense criticizing what Mrs. Finnegan has done. What do you say to the Belizean people about what has happened here and the immigration department, the ministry accommodating Mrs. Finnegan now?"

Edmund Zuniga, CEO - Ministry of Immigration
"I don't see it as accommodating Mrs. Finnegan, we are public officers and the people who are here tonight are members of the public who have a concern with immigration."

The politician who set up the meeting, UDP standard bearer Dianne Finnegan acted as translator for the full 3 hour session.