SZLOY v Minister for Immigration

[2008] FMCA 97

FEDERAL MAGISTRATES COURT OF AUSTRALIA

SZLOY v MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION & ANOR [2008] FMCA 97

MIGRATION – RRT decision – Indian applicant claiming persecution by Muslims over land claim – Tribunal found no Convention reason – no arguable jurisdictional error – application dismissed at show‑cause hearing.

Federal Magistrates Court Rules 2001 (Cth), r.44.12(1)(a)

Applicant: SZLOY

First Respondent: MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION & CITIZENSHIP

Second Respondent: REFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL

File Number: SYG 3402 of 2007

Judgment of: Smith FM

Hearing date: 29 January 2008

Delivered at: Sydney

Delivered on: 29 January 2008

REPRESENTATION

Counsel for the Applicant: Applicant in person

Counsel for the First Respondent: Ms B Anniwell

Solicitors for the Respondents: Australian Government Solicitor

ORDERS

1. The application is dismissed under Rule 44.12(1)(a) on the ground that it does not raise an arguable case for the relief claimed. 

2. The applicant must pay the first respondent’s costs in the sum of $2,500. 

FEDERAL MAGISTRATES
COURT OF AUSTRALIA AT
SYDNEY

SYG 3402 of 2007

SZLOY

Applicant

And

MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION & CITIZENSHIP

First Respondent

REFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL

Second Respondent

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT

(revised from transcript)

1. The applicant came to Australia in April 2007 with 22 people from the Rajasthan Indoor Cricket Federation, who were invited to come to Australia by the Australian International Sports Academy to play cricket matches.  Just before their visas expired, they all employed a migration agent to lodge protection visa applications.  No particular claim was put forward in the applicant’s protection visa application, but a letter from the agent said in relation to all his clients:

   Their brief claim is, they do not have civil and political freedom in India.  They suffer from poverty & starvation and all these happen as a result of their particular social group, “farmers from Rajasthan”.  

2. A delegate refused the applicant’s application on 19 May 2007, and the applicant then attended a hearing by the Tribunal at which he explained his particular claims. 

3. In a decision handed down on 27 September 2007, the Tribunal summarised the applicant’s claims and its reasons for rejecting the principal claim.  It said: 

   As referred to above, the applicant said at the hearing before me that the agent who had prepared his original application had not told him what was written in the statement accompanying that application.  He said that the only problems he had had in India were that their family elders had not given them their proper share of the ancestral land and that a group of Muslims had wanted to confiscate the piece of land belonging to his father.  He said that he had sold this piece of land in January 2007 to another Muslim and that this had enraged the group of Muslims who had wanted to confiscate the piece of land.  He said that they had beaten him up a couple of times and had threatened to kill his whole family, that ten days before the hearing his father had been beaten up by these Muslims and that he was sure that they would not leave him alive.  The applicant suggested that this was a religious conflict but, as I put to him, his evidence does not suggest that the Muslims singled him out because he is a Hindu.  His evidence suggests that their motivation was the piece of land which they wanted.  I do not accept on the evidence before me that one or more of the five Convention reasons is the essential and significant reason for the persecution which the applicant fears from the Muslims, as required by paragraph 91R(1)(a) of the Act. 

4. The Tribunal also found that the applicant had not suggested that there was a failure of protection by the Indian police due to a Convention reason, and that the applicant’s complaint about his family not getting their proper share of the ancestral land did not raise a Convention reason.  It therefore was not satisfied that he had a well‑founded fear of persecution in India for a Convention reason now or in the reasonably foreseeable future.  It affirmed the delegate’s decision. 

5. The applicant now asks the Court to set aside the Tribunal’s decision and to order it to reconsider his refugee claims.  His application has been set down today to consider whether it raises an arguable case for the making of these orders.  The applicant has been given an opportunity to amend the grounds of his application and to file further evidence after receiving a bundle of relevant documents and a referral for free legal advice.  He has not, however, filed any additional documents, and relies on his original application. 

6. This contains the following three unparticularised grounds: 

   1.The RRT denied proper application of law to the applicant. 

   2.The RRT denied natural justice to the applicant. 

   3.The RRT did not follow due procedure. 

7. The applicant had no argument today to present to me to explain how these contentions relate to the present Tribunal’s decision or procedures.  I am unable for myself to identify any arguable ground of jurisdictional error affecting the Tribunal’s decision. 

8. In my opinion, the application does not raise an arguable case for the relief claimed, and it is appropriate to dismiss the application under r.44.12(1)(a).

I certify that the preceding eight (8) paragraphs are a true copy of the reasons for judgment of Smith FM

Associate:  Lilian Khaw

Date:  6 February 2008