-immigration consultant
A judge on the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada has granted a 15-year-old Guyanese girl refugee status following a hearing on October 7, 2008 in Toronto.
According to a press release from immigration consultant in Toronto, Balwant Persaud, who represented her, it took the Board three months to reach a decision which was finally made on January 12, 2009.
According to the lawyer, the schoolgirl was gang raped and brutalized by three men with connections in high places in Guyana.
She was threatened not to report the matter to the police or it would endanger her and her family.
The immigration consultant said that he was successful in obtaining a visitor’s visa for the girl at the Canadian embassy in Trinidad and she travelled to Canada and filed a refugee claim. He added that he cited many cases in Guyana that were similar to his client’s situation and which the government and police do nothing about.
Persaud said that numerous newspaper articles and real life situations were presented to the Immigration and Refugee Board to support the girl’s claim about the injustice in Guyana.
