Date: 20020925
Docket: IMM-4499-01
Neutral Citation: 2002 FCT 992
Between:
DAVID DUBE
NHLALOENHLE NDAWANA
Applicant(s)
- and -
THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP
AND IMMIGRATION
Respondent
REASONS FOR ORDER
PINARD J.:
The applicants seek judicial review of a decision of the Refugee Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board (the Board) dated August 28, 2001, in which the Board determined they were not Convention refugees as defined in subsection 2(1) of the Immigration Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. I-2.
The applicants are citizens of Zimbabwe. They allege they suffered persecution based on their political opinion and social group.
The Board determined the applicants not to be Convention refugees because they were not credible and failed to prove that their fear was well-founded. The Board supports this conclusion with the following reasons:
- The principal applicant, the husband, visited South Africa in July 2000 and returned to his country the same month. He explained that he did not claim there at the time because his life was not in danger. When asked to clarify this statement, the principal applicant contradicted himself.
- The Board doubts the incident that allegedly occurred at the principal applicant's home on April 5, 2000 as he could not explain how he knew the five people who had entered his home were from the Central Intelligence Organisation.
- The principal applicant could not provide an adequate response when asked why he would campaign for Mr. Christoper Dube in Matabela South Province which is 450 kilometres from Harare.
- The principal applicant could not explain why his Liberty Party Card indicated his residence to be in Bulawayo when he had been living in Harare since January 1999.
- The principal applicant could not name the Secretary General of the Liberty Party when he became member.
- The Board questioned the principal applicant's membership in the Liberty Party as he could not explain the advance payments of his membership.
- The Board does not believe that the Liberty Party Card was printed in 1996 as it starts subscriptions from 1998. Further, he could not explain why the card was stamped "Liberty Party"when he testified that its full name since inception was "Liberty Party of Zimbabwe".
- The Board does not accept the female applicant's explanation on the subject of her card which had the same discrepancies.
- The female applicant had difficulty in situating where she was living at certain points of her life.
- The Board fails to understand the female applicant's weekly travels to Bulawayo, some four hundred kilometres away from Harare.
- When the female applicant explained the April 2000 incident, she contradicted her husband's Personal Information Form as well as his testimony.
- Both applicants' testimony clashed when they explained having seen a doctor for the April 2000 incident.
It is settled that with respect to credibility and the assessment of evidence, this Court may not substitute its decision for that of such a tribunal, when the applicant has failed to prove that the tribunal's decision was based on an erroneous finding of fact that it made in a perverse or capricious manner or without regard for the material before it (paragraph 18.1(4)(d) of the Federal Court Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. F-7).
In the case at bar, upon hearing counsel for the parties and after examining the evidence as well as the transcript, it is my opinion that the Board clearly and unequivocally determined the applicants not to be credible and offered several examples in its decision where the principal applicant as well as his wife contradicted themselves after being given the opportunity to explain obvious discrepancies in their testimony. Except for a minor error with respect to the female applicant's attendance at the Liberty Party Women League meetings in Bulawayo, an error which is not material to the decision reached, I am not persuaded that the inferences of the Board, which is a specialized tribunal, could not reasonably have been drawn (see Aguebor v. M.E.I. (1993), 160 N.R. 315 (F.C.A.)).
Consequently, the application for judicial review is dismissed.
JUDGE
OTTAWA, ONTARIO
September 25, 2002
FEDERAL COURT OF CANADA
TRIAL DIVISION
NAMES OF COUNSEL AND SOLICITORS OF RECORD
DOCKET: IMM-4499-01
STYLE OF CAUSE: DAVID DUBE, NHLALOENHLE NDAWANA v. THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION
PLACE OF HEARING: Montréal, Quebec
DATE OF HEARING: August 14, 2002
REASONS FOR ORDER OF THE HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE PINARD
DATED: September 25, 2002
APPEARANCES:
Me Michael Dorey FOR THE APPLICANT
Me Guy M. Lamb FOR THE RESPONDENT
SOLICITORS OF RECORD:
Mr. Michael Dorey FOR THE APPLICANT
Montréal, Quebec
Mr. Morris Rosenberg FOR THE RESPONDENT
Deputy Attorney General of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario