SZJOP v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship

[2008] HCASL 405

SZJOP
v
MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION AND CITIZENSHIP & ANOR
[2008] HCASL 405
S110/2008

1. The applicant is a citizen of Papua New Guinea.  On 18 May 2006 a delegate of the first respondent refused her application for a protection visa.  On 3 October 2006 the Refugee Review Tribunal affirmed the delegate's decision.  The applicant claimed to fear harm from a former Minister of the Papua New Guinea government, who she claimed had raped her, threatened her with death, and physically assaulted her on a number of occasions.  She claimed to have been forced into hiding with a family in Port Moresby, for whom she had worked.  The Tribunal noted some doubts as to the applicant's account, but accepted that she had experienced sexual and physical assault and threats from a particular person.  However, the Tribunal was not satisfied that that person was a former government Minister:  thus any harm she faced did not have a Convention nexus.  Moreover, since the applicant had been able to avoid coming into contact with her aggressor in Port Moresby, there was no real chance that she would suffer serious harm at his hands in the future.

2. On 9 October 2007 the Federal Magistrates Court dismissed an application for review of the Tribunal's decision.  Emmett FM rejected the applicant's submission that she had not been given sufficient opportunity to explain the threat to her life at the Tribunal hearing.  On a fair reading of the Tribunal's decision, it was clear that the applicant had had a reasonable opportunity to put her claims.  Her Honour also dismissed the applicant's further two grounds:  that conditions in Papua New Guinea had deteriorated, and that the decision of the Tribunal was unfair.  Neither ground demonstrated a reviewable jurisdictional error on the part of the Tribunal.

3. On 26 February 2008 the Federal Court (Jacobson J) dismissed the applicant's appeal.  His Honour found that only one of the applicant's ten grounds was argued before the Federal Magistrate.  Following the decision in VUAX v Minister for Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs[1], his Honour dealt with the only new ground which had some merit, namely, whether the Tribunal was required to consider the relocation test in Randhawa v Minister for Immigration, Local Government and Ethnic Affairs[2].  His Honour held that the test had no application, because the Tribunal had found that there was no Convention nexus.

   [1][2004] FCAFC 158.

   [2](1994) 52 FCR 437.

4. The application to this Court is brought out of time and the applicant requires an order under r 41.02.2 of the High Court Rules 2004 dispensing with the requirement to comply with the time limit in r 41.02.1. We would not make this order. The applicant has not advanced any question of law such as would justify the grant of special leave to appeal. The Tribunal's finding, that there was no Convention nexus, was clearly open to it: there is no reason to doubt the correctness of the decisions below.

5. Pursuant to r 41.10.5 we direct the Registrar to draw up, sign and seal an order dismissing the application.

W.M.C. Gummow	S.M. Kiefel
31 July 2008