Date: 20050505
Docket: IMM-1185-04
Citation: 2005 FC 630
BETWEEN:
PATRICIA DANSO
Applicant
and
THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION
Respondent
REASONS FOR ORDER
PHELAN J.
[1] The Applicant is a 26 years old female citizen of Ghana who claimed persecution based on membership in a particular social group, namely, women forced into arranged marriages. Her application for refugee status was dismissed by the Refugee Protection Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board (the "Panel") based, principally on credibility as well as the existence of state protection for her and the availability of an Internal Flight Alternative ("IFA").
[2] The Applicant claimed that she had become betrothed by to the chief of her village when she was 10 years old. After completing junior secondary school, she lived at home for three years. However, in June 1998, she was pressured to go and live with the chief where she was "trained" by his other wives pending her actual marriage.
[3] In August 1998, she ran away from the chief's home and went to stay with friends in a nearby city. She alleges that the chief was angry at her actions and had organized a search for her.
[4] In order to avoid being caught and punished, the Applicant went to Cuba where her uncle was the Ghanian ambassador. After two and a half years in Cuba, upon her uncle's ambassadorial term expiring, she came to Canada as a visitor in April 2000. A little over a year later she applied for refugee status.
[5] The Panel found that credibility was the principal issue. In that regard the Panel noted the following:
- the implausibility that a person betrothed to a village chief at a young age would be allowed to complete school;
- the documentary evidence which indicated that such forced marriages were dying out in Ghana and likely practised only among those who are illiterate, in rural communities, the non-affluent and traditionally minded;
- the inconsistences in her PIF, in her own story about her communications with her uncle, and about her work history in Ghana;
- the one year delay in applying for refugee status and her failure to provide a credible explanation for the delay.
[6] The Panel noted that documentary evidence confirms the evidence of state protection, both from police authorities, and organizations dedicated to assisting women.
[7] Finally the Panel concluded that she had an IFA in Accra and it did not find plausible that her family or her suitor would pursue her there.
[8] While there may have been some minor factual errors, the decision as a whole is comprehensive, balanced and accurate. The credibility findings were open to the Panel and were reasonably arrived at based on the evidence. They are clearly not patently unreasonable.
[9] In addition, the Panel's finding of a viable IFA, for which the standard of review is patent unreasonableness, is fatal to the Applicant's claim. Even if some of the credibility findings could not stand up to a probing examination (a finding which I do not make), there is nothing patently unreasonable about this IFA finding, or indeed about the finding of the existence of state protection.
[10] For these reasons, this judicial review will be dismissed. There is no question for certification.
(s) "Michael L. Phelan"
Judge
FEDERAL COURT
NAMES OF COUNSEL AND SOLICITORS OF RECORD
DOCKET: IMM-1185-04
STYLE OF CAUSE: PATRICIA DANSO
Applicant
- and -
THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP
AND IMMIGRATION
Respondent
PLACE OF HEARING: TORONTO, ONTARIO
DATE OF HEARING: THURSDAY, APRIL 21, 2005
REASONS FOR ORDER: PHELAN J.
DATED: May 5, 2005
APPEARANCES:
Mr. Yiadom A. Atuobi-Danso
Mr. Kweku Ackaah-Boafo FOR THE APPLICANT
Ms. Marina Stefanovic FOR THE RESPONDENT
SOLICITORS OF RECORD:
Yiadom A. Atuobi-Danso
Toronto, Ontario FOR THE APPLICANT
John H. Sims, Q.C.
Deputy Attorney General of Canada FOR THE RESPONDENT
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