PP11

Hi All
Can any one recommend a lawyer in St Lucia that can help in obtaining a St Lucian passport? I am currently living in Europe.

Gozit

I don't think you'll be able to find anyone on here as this is a site for British expats although there may be someone. You say you are living in Europe. Are you eligible for naturalisation as a citizen of your country of residence which would enable you to get a passport from there?

BritInParis

What's the basis of your claim to Saint Lucian citizenship? If you already are a citizen then you won't need a lawyer to apply for your passport.

Pistolpete2

You probably will!

There are no end of problems with identity in St Lucia due to disparities between the way names were written on various requisite documents and what people are now known as, for example, (The French Priests problem and people use aliases) and though some lawyers in St Lucia are less competent than others, it might make sense to use one, particularly when not in St Lucia for any period of time.

Even if you have a passport, you could still encounter problems at renewal or on migration to the machine-readable passports due to these name issues which were not spotted on first getting one because St Lucia has not maintained an adequate computerised system which ensured that the data put in was gospel. It's a real minefield.

St Lucia yellow pages have lists of lawyers but the names Barnard V, Floissac Fleming, McNamara and Remy are among those who are reputable.

BritInParis

If the OP was born overseas and has not registered as a Saint Lucian citizen then his local Embassy/High Commission is likely to be his first port of call.

Services

Pistolpete2

Indeed, but the St Lucia High Commission is just another face of GOVERNMENT and its the government functions in this issue that are at the root of the problem, bearing in mind the relationship issues that go with the 'territory' in St Lucia.

I just hope that the OP's requisite relatives for the purposes of applying for the passport are accessible as well as clear and concise in terms of their paperwork because even for those who live in St Lucia, their relationship with the Registry of Civil Status can be really strained when it comes of applying for a passport.

I've known of good folks who have waited for years to get the birth certificate names properly aligned because the registry just doesn't have the proper legal resources to move things forward, just like the rest of the justice system.

Of importance is the fact that those who were born in St Lucia before 22nd February 1979 (Independence Day) are St Lucian (if - one hopes , this is stated in their other passport for evidentiary purposes) so they don't actually need a St Lucian passport to reside there or stay beyond the tourist's 42 days. Our kid travels with his letter from the Ministry of Home Affairs ref his entitlement to a St Lucian passport tucked inside his UK passport.

Gordon Barlow

It would be helpful to hear from the OP. His silence leads me to wonder if he might be just looking for a third-country passport on spec, and doesn't have any connection with St Lucia.

Gozit

He could buy a Maltese one for €1 million

BritInParis

If that's the case then he should be looking at St Kitts and Nevis' Citizenship-by-Investment Program.

Citizenship by Investment Program | Citizenship By Investment

PP11

Hi All
Thanks for you advise someone has given me a name for a lawyer and I have contacted them awaiting on a reply so again thanks for your help see you in St Lucia

PP11

The St Lucia High Commission is in the UK and is as hard to communicated with as with communicated with the country itself.

Pistolpete2

Par for the course. You can't get anything done in St Lucia without physically going 'there' - nobody important picks up their phone or answers letters and the numbers in the government directory (blue pages) often don't seem to correspond to warm bodies anyway.

Thankfully, the Inland Revenue now has an online facility for efiling purposes. Also thankfully, supposedly St Lucia is better than many of the other Caribbean islands.

The can-do man, impressive Sen. Hon. Dr. James Fletcher, Minister for Public Service, Information and Broadcasting, Minister for Sustainable Development, Energy, Science and Technology has a lot on his plate to (also) introduce ecommerce into Government's interface with the public at large.

Dragged screaming into the 20th Century. Happy days!

All of us could really use somebody on the ground in St Lucia to attend to our affairs there from time to time, before they blow out of control due to lack of proper attention. It's getting things done and dusted so that one can move on to the next challenge that is often so very hard.