The spread of the coronavirus pandemic (covid-19) around the world has resulted in the closure of borders and airports and therefore the blocking of several people in difficult situations, in particular immigrants. in canada, a law has been put in place to prohibit access to Canadian territory to immigrants who have obtained their visas after March 18, 2020.
Immigrants from canada face a very delicate situation after the implementation of a law which prohibits immigrants who have obtained their immigration visas as well as their copr (confirmation of permanent residence) from going to canada if they we obtained after the date of March 18, 2020, i.e. after the announcement of the closure of borders and airports across the world, due to the coronavirus pandemic (covid-19).
Thus, several Maghrebi immigrants from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia were turned away by the immigration services upon their arrival at Pierre-Elliott-Trudeau international airport in Montréal in Canada. some of them were not even able to catch the plane at their departure airports, despite purchasing tickets from the airlines.
Currently, the royal air Maroc company, continues to sell tickets to the destination of canada to Algerian nationals, the commercial agency in paris guarantees them the possibility of arriving at the destination, however, the latter are subsequently banned from to continue their connection to Montreal once they land on Moroccan soil.
With regard to the Tunisair company, tickets are sold to Tunisian nationals while the border services of Tunis airport forbid them to board the day of their departure. as for air Algeria, the company schedules flights to Montréal, then cancels them itself with the impossibility of reimbursing the passengers.
“Immigrants trapped”
Faced with the haphazard application of this law, exclusively by the Legault government, premier of the province of Quebec, immigrants find themselves in a very delicate situation, and seem to be trapped after having followed a dream which, in the end, has turned into a nightmare.
Indeed, to go towards this new adventure which promises a better life, some of them quitted their jobs and sold their goods, however, they were confronted with a cruel reality which reduced them to the statistical figures for the services of immigration .
Recounting his experience, a young Algerian student let it be known that he had been turned away at Casablanca airport in Morocco, on the pretext that “his arrival was too premature compared to the start of his session, scheduled in a month “. “I needed two weeks to complete my final registration process and make my mark in the city,” he explained. Desperate, the young student said he now finds himself “in an airport, waiting for a decision to be able to return to the country.”
In a similar situation but according to another scenario, an Algerian family of four was able to reach Canadian territory, only, “the immigration agent refused to validate their permanent residence”. “Their passports have been confiscated,” and they are awaiting a decision by ircc, “which risks deportation, according to their lawyer.
Another immigrant, this time from Burkina Faso, was stranded at Casablanca airport. “I will call it a detention, we are stranded in an airport, we sleep on the chairs, we are condemned to stay here for many days, our meals are reduced to tomato sandwiches then in a hurry and this for each meal, if i knew i would live that i would never have quit my job, sell my goods and dared to believe that canada was a country of rights, if we flee our house it is to find a better future, but we do not represent than a statistical objective for ircc ”, she denounced.
Paradoxically, canada announces an increase in its immigration quotas to 401,000 immigrants in 2021, 411,000 in 2022 and 421,000 in 2022, are those just the numbers?
