Date: 20030401
Docket: IMM-2800-02
Neutral citation: 2003 FCT 386
Ottawa, Ontario, this 1st day of April, 2003
PRESENT: The Honourable Madam Justice Heneghan
BETWEEN:
EDOSA FRANCESCA ADAMS
Applicant
and
THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION
Respondent
[1] Ms. Edosa Francesca Adams (the "Applicant") seeks judicial review of the decision of the Immigration and Refugee Board, Convention Refugee Determination Division (the "Board"). In its decision, dated May 27, 2002, the Board found the Applicant not to be a Convention refugee.
[2] The Applicant, a citizen of Nigeria, bases her claim for Convention refugee status upon a well-founded fear of persecution arising from her membership in a particular social group, that is, women in Nigeria who fear persecution on gender grounds. Specifically, the Applicant fears being forced into an arranged marriage.
[3] The Applicant is a lawyer. She completed her education in and qualified as a lawyer in Nigeria in 1999. She was called to the Nigeria Bar in September 1999 and began working in Lagos in November 1999. She claimed that upon returning to visit her family in Benin City in December 1999, just before Christmas, she was told by her father that he had pledged her to marry a native doctor. The Applicant claimed that this pledge was made by her father in 1982 in exchange for the native doctor's treatment of her father's illness. The Applicant, who was ten years old at the time of the pledge, alleged that she was unaware of this until December 1999.
[4] The Applicant claimed that she protested to her father about this plan but her father disregarded her pleas. She alleged that she was forcibly removed from her father's house by family members and brought to the house of the native doctor. She claimed that the doctor performed some kind of rite with chicken blood, raped her and restrained her. After three days, the doctor permitted her to leave, allegedly for the purpose of returning to her father's house to collect personal possessions.
[5] Instead of returning to her family's home the Applicant went to the police and reported her circumstances. However, she received no positive assistance from the police who told her that this was a family matter.
[6] The Applicant then travelled to Jos where she remained in hiding for approximately seven weeks. She departed Nigeria for Canada on February 25, 2000, arriving on February 26, 2000. She filed her claim for Convention refugee status in Canada on February 28, 2000, two days after arriving in this country.
[7] The Board rejected the Applicant's claim on the basis of credibility. It found her account of being forced into a marriage implausible, having regard to her age, education and residence in an urban centre of Nigeria. It found that the Applicant's story was implausible in relation to the documentary evidence that it accepted.
[8] The documentary evidence accepted by the Board focussed on the likelihood that pre-pubescent young women in rural areas would be forced into marriage. The documentary evidence did not address the possibility that women like the Applicant would be forced to marry against their will.
[9] The Board also found that the Applicant lacked a subjective basis to her claim. This finding was also related to its assessment of the evidence about forced marriages in relation to young pre-pubescent women.
[10] The Board is the trier of fact and is entitled to make reasonable findings regarding the credibility of a claimant's story based on implausibilities, common sense and rationality; see Aguebor v. Canada (Minister of Employment and Immigration) (1993), 140 N.R. 315 (C.A.) and Shahamati v. Canada (Minister of Employment and Immigration), [1994] F.C.J. No. 415 (C.A.)(QL). In the absence of an overriding error giving rise to capricious or perverse factual findings, the decision of the Board should stand. This is the opinion expressed by the Court in Oduro v. Canada (Minister of Employment and Immigration) (1993), 66 F.T.R. 106, Tao v. Canada (Minister of Employment and Immigration), [1993] F.C.J. No. 622 (T.D.), as well as many other decisions.
[11] In this case, I find that the conclusions of the Board were reasonably open to it. As stated by Justice Noël (as he then was) in Oduro, supra, at paragraphs 12-14, the presence of a rational basis for factual findings is the applicable test:
This is a case that gives me substantial difficulty. The Applicant's testimony was consistent throughout notwithstanding the fact that he underwent a very detailed and lengthy examination. On each of the Board's findings of implausibility, I would have been inclined to find otherwise. In particular, the Applicant's testimony as to his escape appears to me to be quite plausible.
However, it is not for me to substitute my discretion for that of the Board. The question I must answer is whether it was open to the Board on the evidence to conclude as it did. Recognizing that if confronted with the same evidence, I would have been inclined to hold otherwise, I cannot say that the Board ignored the evidence before it or acted capriciously.
It drew inferences which were adverse to the Applicant's claim, and the fact that I might have seen the matter differently does not allow me to intervene in the absence of an overriding error. I have been unable to find such an error. The Application is therefore dismissed...
[12] I am not persuaded that the Board erred in the manner in which it assessed the evidence submitted by the Applicant. The findings of the Board were reasonably open to it. There is no basis for judicial intervention and the application for judicial review is dismissed. There is no question for certification arising.
ORDER
The application for judicial review is dismissed. There is no question for certification arising.
"E. Heneghan"
J.F.C.C.
FEDERAL COURT OF CANADA
Names of Counsel and Solicitors of Record
DOCKET: IMM-2800-02
STYLE OF CAUSE: EDOSA FRANCESCA ADAMS V. MCI
DATE OF HEARING: March 25, 2003
PLACE OF HEARING: Toronto, Ontario
REASONS FOR ORDER
AND ORDER: The Honourable Madam Justice Heneghan
DATED: April 1, 2003
APPEARANCES BY: Kingsley Jesuorobo
For the Applicant
Kevin Lunney
For the Respondent
SOLICITORS OF RECORD: Kingsley Jesurobo
Barrister and Solicitor
968 Wilson Avenue, 3rd Floor
North York, ON M3K 1E7
Tel:416-398-8647
Fax:416-398-4549
For the Applicant
Mr. Lorne McClenaghan
Department of Justice
130 King Street West, Suite 3400, Box 36
Toronto, Ontario
M5X 1K6
Tel:416-973-2300
Fax:416-954-8982
For the Respondent