[At-Large] The visa to Canada and fall of participation of LAC in ATLAS III

Evan Leibovitch evan at telly.org
Sat Oct 26 09:14:13 UTC 2019


On Fri, 25 Oct 2019 at 19:26, Peters Omoragbon <petersomoragbon at gmail.com>
wrote:


> It is not only insulting but dehumanising for Canada to disrespect
> Africans with this racist diplomacy.
>

It's my understanding, from my own attempts to intervene on behalf of
people needing visas for events in which I have been involved, that the
problem is not racial so much as country-specific. The overly harsh
measures stem from significant numbers of people from specific countries
coming on tourist or conference visas who never go home and then apply for
Canadian immigrant status from inside the country. This is widely seen
domestically as "queue-jumping" and unfair to the conventional immigration
process. As a result, tourist or conference applications from these
designated countries are checked against a number of criteria that indicate
the likeliness of  a traveller to return home after the trip. I'm not an
expert in this and I don't fully agree with the policies so I won't defend
them, but to the best of my awareness this is the rationale.

Not all of the countries flagged this way are in Africa (as Sergio noted in
the start of this thread); the list changes periodically based on the
sources of the "queue jumpers". So I'm not sure that the policy is racist,
or that calling it racist is actually going to accomplish anything useful.
I fully understand the insult and that it's dehumanizing, and the issue is
highly political within Canada. However, attributing sinister motivation
that isn't in evidence will not get you far.

People with valid USA and European visas to be told they cannot leave
> Canada after the event.
>

OK, that's just a complete untruth. Unlike many countries, Canada doesn't
even do passport checks for departures. Whether any other country will
allow travellers in is a different story, but in my many years of age I'm
not aware of any foreigner denied the ability to leave Canada unless
charged with a crime.

The biggest problem that I have encountered is that the visa application
process needs to be started WAY in advance. Many are improperly rejected.
An review/appeal process exists, but it doesn't happen quickly and
sometimes people just run out of time. Having a good Canadian host to help
with visa issues is important.

What is in Canada.
>

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/canada

The visa problem wouldn't exist if nobody wanted to move here.

We need open up an online protest for signatures demanding Canada respects
> Cross borders'foreign relations!
>

I have no idea what you're asking for. Please be specific on what relations
need to be respected that are not now.
- Evan
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