SZOER v Minister for Immigration

FEDERAL MAGISTRATES COURT OF AUSTRALIA

SZOER v MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION & ANOR [2010] FMCA 382

MIGRATION – Review of Refugee Review Tribunal decision – refusal of a protection visa – applicant claiming ethnic persecution in Fiji – Tribunal giving no weight to three documents submitted by the applicant – whether the Tribunal should have made enquiries about those documents before deciding to give them no weight considered.

Migration Act 1958 (Cth), s.424A

Luu v Renevier (1989) 91 ALR 39
Minister for Immigration v Le [2007] FCA 1318
Minister for Immigration v SZIAI (2009) 259 ALR 429
SZMJM v Minister for Immigration [2010] FCA 309
SZNWA v Minister for Immigration [2010] FCA 470

Applicant: SZOER

First Respondent: MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION & CITIZENSHIP

Second Respondent: REFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL

File Number: SYG 450 of 2010

Judgment of: Driver FM

Hearing date: 2 June 2010

Delivered at: Sydney

Delivered on: 17 June 2010

REPRESENTATION

Solicitors for the Applicant: Mr T Silva
Silva Solicitors

Counsel for the Respondents: Mr T Reilly

Solicitors for the Respondents: Sparke Helmore

ORDERS

1. The application is dismissed.

FEDERAL MAGISTRATES
COURT OF AUSTRALIA
AT SYDNEY

SYG 450 of 2010

SZOER

Applicant

And

MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION & CITIZENSHIP

First Respondent

REFUGEE REVIEW TRIBUNAL

Second Respondent

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT

Introduction and background

1. This is an application to review a decision of the Refugee Review Tribunal (“the Tribunal”).  The decision was made on 5 February 2010.  The Tribunal affirmed a decision of a delegate of the Minister not to grant the applicant a protection visa. 

2. The applicant is from Fiji and had made claims of persecution based upon her Indian ethnicity.  She had travelled to Australia on several occasions and arrived most recently on 19 February 2009.  She applied for a protection visa on 13 May 2009.  The applicant was interviewed by the Minister’s delegate on 17 July 2009.  The delegate refused the applicant’s visa application on 12 August 2009.  The applicant sought review of that decision by the Tribunal on 31 August 2009.  The Tribunal was unable to make a favourable decision on the papers and invited the applicant to attend a hearing.  The Tribunal conducted hearings on 5 November 2009, 11 November 2009 and 17 November 2009.  It appears that the two earlier hearings were adjourned because on the first occasion there was no interpreter and on the second occasion the interpreter had been booked for an insufficient period. 

3. The applicant claimed to fear harm in Fiji for reason of her race and imputed political opinion. She claimed to be Indo-Fijian and that her father was a member of the Fijian Labour Party. She claimed to have been harassed by ethnic Fijians in her village, where she claimed there was only one other Indo-Fijian family. As ultimately presented to the Tribunal she claimed to have suffered harassment from young men saying things to her, banging on her door, pushing her and ripping her clothes, and throwing a stone at her, in 2006, 2007 and 2008. She claimed that she had not applied…