Truth & reconciliation after ‘cultural genocide’

By Michael Lashley Dear Fellow Canadians: I want you to know there are many justifiable reasons that led the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to describe the experiences and the consequences of the residential schools as “cultural genocide”. While those reasons were set out in great detail in the Summary Report released two days ago (June […]

Guyanese woman wins one more chance

By Sukhram Ramkissoon A Guyanese woman whom I will call Veera recently was successful in challenging the decision of a Trinidad and Tobago visa officer who refused an application for an authorization to return to Canada that impacted an underlying spousal sponsorship. According to court documents she had a long immigration history, including approximately nine […]

Guyana: elections, unity and trust

As the Guyanese people move forward from their recent elections, their journey on the road to unity must involve concentrated efforts to build trust. They have launched that journey with at least one major success for which they deserve our sincere congratulations: the triumph of the democratic electoral process. The many international observer missions have […]

Appeal allows spouse to enter Canada

By Sukhram Ramkissoon In mid-2013, a young man from the Caribbean – now a Canadian citizen – sponsored his spouse and his 16-year-old stepson to Canada from his country of birth. I will refer to him as Tahid, whom I represented before the Appeal Division. In mid-2014 a visa officer after examination of documents and […]

The obsessive Stephen Harper

By Oscar Wailoo Omar Khadr is finally out of jail, no thanks to the Stephen Harper government. He and his government were told at least three times by the Canadian courts in unambiguous language that the ongoing effort to punish the Canada-born child soldier offends our Constitution in every way. Khadr was 15 when he […]

To War or not to war: your decision

By Michael Lashley I make no apologies for repeating my central theme in hundreds of different contexts, situations and policy areas: It is always your decision; before or after the fact, you make the decision by urging or by ratifying, by choice or by complacency. However, I do apologize for using some of the most […]

The three-horse race of 2015

This year’s federal election is turning into a three-horse race, the contenders being the outgoing Conservatives plus the Liberals and the NDP. The challenge for two of the three is that they do not seem to have moved forward in significantly increasing their share of federal ridings in any specific province or federal territory: the […]

Vote makes uniting Guyana a hard task

By Ronald Austin On May 11, after the highest turnout since 1997, the National and Regional Elections of 2015 caused the first change of government in Guyana since 1992. And the political entity which narrowly toppled the PPP administration was a coalition of multiethnic parties. The expectation was that this coalition, in defeating the PPP, […]

Ukrainian, 81, may make second application

By Sukhram Ramkissoon An 81-year-old citizen of Ukraine who seeks to gain permanent residence status in Canada and lives with his family and his daughter was recently granted judicial review by Federal Court to resubmit his application for a Temporary Resident Permit. The man, who I will call Hector, was left in the care of […]

PPP tried lived in the past and failed

At different press conferences, the two main political parties claimed victory in Monday’s national and regional elections but the Guyana Elections Commission had to warn at another that it was the only entity that can legitimize the winner. The current situation is a compound of outdated politics, an outdated electoral system and a failure to […]