Canada Immigration Case law Canada, Abdi, IMMIGRATION — Refugee status — Procedure

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IMMIGRATION — Refugee status — Procedure — Applicant claimed that he was Sufi Muslim from minority clan in Somalia and that he would be murdered by terrorist organization called Al-Shabaab if he stayed in Somalia — He arrived in Canada in November 2013 and asked for refugee protection shortly thereafter — Refugee Protection Division (“RPD”) rejected applicant’s claim because he had not supplied enough evidence to prove he was from Somalia — Since there was no functioning administration in that country which could produce official identity cards, applicant had produced identity witness who claimed that he used to sell livestock to applicant’s father in Somalia, but RPD did not find witness credible — Refugee Appeal Division (“RAD”) upheld decision of RPD, finding all of applicant’s new evidence inadmissible — Applicant applied for judicial review of decision of RAD — Application allowed — RAD did not properly apply test for admission of new evidence — It found new affidavit of applicant offered nothing new when, in fact, it was almost exclusively about applicant’s friendship with his new identity witness — It was also unreasonable for RAD to reject affidavit of new witness — Just because applicant had encountered new witness and had himself been considered not to be credible by RPD was no reason for RAD to blindly find new witness’ affidavit not to be credible as well — It was also error for RAD to rely so heavily on fact that RPD had found applicant was not credible — It was unreasonable for RAD simply to presume that very findings that were under appeal were error-free when deciding whether to admit new evidence that could contradict those findings — Matter was returned to RAD for re-determination by different panel member