Guyanese citizens residing on St. Maarten/St. Martin no longer have to travel to Guyana to obtain their travel document since Guyana's Ministry of Foreign Affairs has allowed Diane Douglas to process the machine readable passports from St. Maarten. Douglas can be reached at the Horizon View Hotel on Front Street or at +1721-5261925.
Just recently the Government of Guyana announced that they have authorized all honorary consuls in Caribbean to issue the document.
Guyana has not appointed a consulate on the island because of bureaucratic procedures. However, they have acknowledged Douglas as the person that assists Guyanese on the island. The police and immigration department on the St. Maarten have been working with Douglas when they are in need of assistance with Guyanese that find themselves in problems with the law. It should be noted that the Guyanese Association on St. Maarten is dysfunctional and the members on the board do not provide services to the Guyanese citizens residing on the island.
Guyanese citizens are urged to make use of the services locally and not to take any risks sending their passports to consulates outside of St. Maarten since they would have to pay additional shipping fees. Consulates traveling to St. Maarten to provide the services will charge applicants extra monies to process their application since the consulates in question would have to cover their travel and accommodation expenses. Since the announcement by the Guyana Government authorizing the consuls to process the machine readable passports, it is clear that consuls in the neighboring islands are trying to exploit Guyanese living on the St. Maarten/St. Martin. For more information on the renewal and application of Guyanese passports, citizens of that country are asked to contact Diane Douglas.