Date: 19980817
Docket: IMM-4118-97
BETWEEN:
NADEEM TARIQ
Applicant
- and -
THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION
Respondent
REASONS FOR JUDGEMENT
(Delivered from the Bench at Toronto, Ontario
on Monday, August 17, 1998)
HUGESSEN, J.:
[1] This is an application to review and set aside a decision of a Visa Officer refusing the applicant's application for a visa. Somewhat untypically, this case, as it has developed, requires me to make a finding upon a contested issue of fact.
[2] The decision of the Visa Officer turns essentially upon the fact that she did not have before her any supporting documents to support the applicant's application. It is, I think, common ground that if that is true, that if there were no document submitted to support the application, the Visa Officer could indeed correctly have decided as she did.
[3] The applicant, however, asserts that he did submit the necessary supporting documents relating to his employment history, his financial status, his police record and so forth in support of his application. It is clear that the applicant does not take the position that those documents were submitted with the application. The application itself was submitted in September of 1996 and all the supporting documents that the applicant has now produced with his affidavit in support of this application for judicial review are dated after that month.
[4] The Visa Officer takes the position that a letter of request was sent dated November of 1996 requesting that the necessary supporting documents be submitted and that this was followed up with a fax in June of 1997 to the same effect. She deposes that no documents were received. Her evidence that the request letter and the follow-up fax were sent is not supported by hard copies of the documents in question and such copies do not appear in the tribunal record. However, the evidence is supported by her CAIPS notes which do contain, in the appropriate place, mention that the request letter and follow-up fax were sent on the dates that I have mentioned. The applicant, of course, denies having received either the request letter or the follow-up fax.
[5] In the face of this contradictory evidence, I look for objective facts which would support one view or the other. To some extent, the Visa Officer's contemporary notes help to support her view, but I may say that I do not think they are determining. What I do find to be a strong objective support for the view which she expresses, however, is the fact that the dates of all the supporting documents which the applicant has now produced are all posterior not only to the date of his application but also, and most significantly, posterior to the date of the request letter of November of 1996. That, it seems to me, is an indication that such a letter was sent and received and that it provoked the obtaining of the documents in question, but that for some reason those documents were never submitted to the Visa Officer as they should have been.
[6] That being the case, I conclude that the application must fail and I shall render judgement accordingly subject to any submissions counsel may have to make with respect to certifying an important question.
"James K. Hugessen"
Judge
Toronto, Ontario
August 17, 1998
FEDERAL COURT OF CANADA
Names of Counsel and Solicitors of Record
COURT NO: IMM-4118-97
| STYLE OF CAUSE: NADEEM TARIQ |
- and -
| THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION |
DATE OF HEARING: MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 1998
PLACE OF HEARING: TORONTO, ONTARIO
REASONS FOR ORDER BY: HUGESSEN, J.
DATED: MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 1998
APPEARANCES: Mr. Nima Hejazi
For the Applicant
Mr. Brian Frimeth
For the Respondent
| SOLICITORS OF RECORD: Angie Codina |
| Codina & Pukitis |
| Barristers & Solicitors |
| 1708-390 Bay Street |
| Toronto, Ontario |
| M5H 2Y2 |
For the Applicant
Morris Rosenberg
Deputy Attorney General
of Canada
For the Respondent
FEDERAL COURT OF CANADA
Date: 19980817
Docket: IMM-4118-97
Between:
| NADEEM TARIQ |
Applicant
- and -
| THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION |
Respondent
REASONS FOR JUDGEMENT