Filip Roger Zalewski arrived in Cancún on April 22 and did not leave the airport.
In The Terminal, the 2004 film starring Tom Hanks, Victor Navorski, a citizen of a small Eastern European country, is unwittingly exiled to New York’s JFK International Airport when a civil war erupts in his homeland. Due to the conflict, Victor’s passport is canceled and he is forced to remain in the terminal, as he cannot set foot on US soil or board any aircraft.
In real life, a Polish citizen was stuck at Cancun International Airport for three months. Filippo Ruggero Zalewski He was held for more than 90 days by Mexican immigration authorities in a small room in Terminal II. There he survives by eating hot dogs and ham and cheese sandwiches provided by an airline.
He hasn’t seen the light since April 22 because when he arrived in Mexico from Panama, immigration officers told him he had an “immigration notice” from 2021, despite having no criminal record. His hope is that a judge will grant him the protection of justice to be released as he does not want to return to Poland.
Who is Filip Roger Zalewski, the Polish “prisoner” at the Cancun airport, and what did he do?
Zalewski, 38, of Polish origin, is confined to the control area that the National Institute of Migration (INM) has in Terminal II of the Cancun International Airport, a space where hundreds of people from different parts every day of the world .
The Pole, director of Poland Zalewski Consulting, left Poland in 2017, two years after Andrzej Duda, of the ultra-conservative Law and Justice party, came to power. government that persecuted him and forced him to close his company in that country.
In September 2020, Zalewski obtained his permanent residency in Mexico, settling in Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo. He now he is in legal limbo.
After a trip to Panama, where her business advisor has representation, local officials asked her to unlock her cell phone and personal computer to check her text messages and social media.
The Polish citizen has been “incarcerated” at the airport since 22 April.
without further explanation, Mexican agents prevented Zalewski from entering Mexico, citing the argument of a “migration alert”, withdrawing the Polish passport, valid until 2027, and the permanent residence card.
Now he hopes that the local justice will resolve his judicial situation as he does not want to return to Poland.
A report from Proceso magazine documents that the European entrepreneur spent 90 days without seeing the light of the sun, with insufficient and isolated food in difficult conditions. According to the report, the government of Andrzej Duda, of the ultra-conservative Law and Justice party, “persecuted him and forced him to close his company in that country”.
Tom Hanks in a scene from the movie “The Terminal” (2004).
The Polish authorities give another version and they say the entrepreneur is accused of organized crime and money laundering, which is why their presence in that country is required. However, since he has permanent residence in Mexico (# 12258333), Zalewski has filed two injunctions to avoid deportation.
Meanwhile, he lives on hot dogs and ham and cheese sandwiches supplied by Copa Airlines; try sleeping on a mat and warm up with an aluminum thermal blanket. He was unable to bathe or have smooth communication with his relatives or trusted people, because his cell phone was seized by the authorities and they only lend it to him twice a day.
He also saw the “miracles” of rejected people who had a migration alert and who, at any moment, were admitted by immigration officers.
In addition to the effects on his physical and mental health, one of the most frustrating situations for the Polish entrepreneur is that, a few meters from the glass door controlled by local agents.those rejected are denied access to food other than those provided by the airlines that brought them to Mexico.
Source: Clarin