Curaçao has recently presented itself as a country within the Kingdom that is building a sound and structured migration policy. On paper, it appears admirable—legal, regulated, transparent. But behind this modern-sounding façade lies a painful truth: the migration policy remains deeply undemocratic, opaque, and detached from the rule of law. 

Migrants in Curaçao—especially those fleeing crisis in neighboring Venezuela—are not treated as human beings with rights, but as case numbers with no voice. They are at the mercy of political whims and ethnic biases, not protected by consistent law or independent oversight. 

The island still lacks a comprehensive asylum law, a modern immigration law, or any independent body to review the decisions made by immigration authorities. Instead, policies are made through ministerial decrees and shifting guidelines, meaning that legal certainty is virtually nonexistent. What applies today can be revoked tomorrow. When rules fail to limit power, the rule of law collapses. 

Migrants are regularly detained without due process, held under deplorable conditions, and deported without proper review. Many are unaware of their rights—if those rights even exist in practice. Children disappear from schools, parents are pulled from jobs, and entire families live in fear of a government that seems more concerned with control than compassion. 

This isn’t policy befitting a democratic society—it resembles the practices of fragile states where fundamental rights are optional and justice is a privilege reserved for those with papers, money, or connections. 

Curaçao’s current approach is not just a moral failure, but a democratic one. Because those without rights, without legal protection, become invisible—and with invisibility comes vulnerability. And when those in power face no boundaries, arbitrariness becomes the norm. 

If Curaçao wishes to take its autonomy seriously, the time has come to lay the true foundations of a state governed by law—one that also applies to the most vulnerable. That means legislation, legal safeguards, transparency, and independent oversight. And most importantly, a societal recognition that the strength of a democracy is measured not by how it treats the powerful, but by how it defends the powerless. 

Until that moment arrives, Curaçao is not a beacon of justice—but an island where the law falls silent, and arbitrariness reigns.