2023 RLLR 52

Citation: 2023 RLLR 52
Tribunal: Refugee Protection Division
Date of Decision: March 30, 2023
Panel: Mamie Hayes
Counsel for the Claimant(s): Timothy Wichert
Country: Venezuela
RPD Number: TC2-29246
Associated RPD Number(s): N/A
ATIP Number: A-2023-01721
ATIP Pages: 000060-000064

DECISION

[1]       MEMBER: So these are the reasons for the decision in the claim of 42 year old, XXXX, who claims to be a citizen of both Venezuela and Mexico.

[2]       You are claiming refugee protection pursuant to Sections 96 and 97(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

[3]       The allegations of your claim are fully set out in your very extensive Basis of Claim form and addendum. In short, you are a professional XXXX with an expertise in    XXXX. In 2017, you worked for the XXXX in charge of XXXX in Venezuela in the XXXX. In your XXXX role, you learned that your superior was in cahoots with the XXXX and they were stealing equipment and XXXX to sell to Colombia. After the XXXX completed his XXXX a number of months later, you made a police complaint against the former XXXX. Shortly afterwards, you were assaulted in XXXX of 2017 and the next day you made a police complaint again and then finally you were again threatened with death if you did not withdraw the two complaints that you made. You immediately went to a different state and received a number of threatening phone calls to withdraw the complaints or else.

[4]       In XXXX of 2018, you were attacked physically, and you escaped to Colombia and then to Mexico in of 2018. In XXXX 2019, the former XXXX against whom you made the complaints was XXXX. In XXXX of 2020, your ex-partner went to the Mexico embassy in Venezuela to get permission for your daughter to travel to Mexico and after that, you were fired from your job and you moved from Mexico City to Toluca for fear of further threats; however, you began to get threatening calls in Toluca. In XXXX of 2021, you tried to make a complaint to the police against the perpetrators but the police in Mexico would not take your complaint due to the XXXX of person you were making the complaint against.

[5]       You learned in 2022 that Mexicans could come to Canada without a visa, and you came to Canada in XXXX of 2022 to seek protection and finally made a refugee claim in August of 2022. The agent of persecution and his associates continued to call and threaten your family members in Venezuela and Mexico until very recently.

[6]       I find that you are a Convention refugee as you have established a serious possibility of persecution should you return to Venezuela or to Mexico based on your imputed political opinion.

[7]       I find that you have established your identity as a national of Venezuela and of Mexico by both your testimony and by the documents you’ve provided including a certified true copy of your Mexican passport and a declaration from a Venezuelan lawyer at Exhibit 5, page 23, that you are a citizen of Venezuela. However, most of your Venezuelan identity documents are in Mexico now with your family members.

[8]       When a claimant swears that facts are true, this creates a presumption that they are true unless there is a valid reason to doubt their truthfulness. I find there were no substantial reasons to doubt your truthfulness. You testified in a straightforward and convincing manner, and you were able to answer all the questions that were asked. There were no discrepancies between any of the documents that you disclosed and your testimony that you were not able to adequately explain. I find you did not exaggerate your testimony even when it may have appeared beneficial to do so and after weighing all of the evidence, I find that you are credible on a balance of probabilities regarding the core elements of the claim, and I therefore believe what you have alleged in support of your claim.  I accept on a balance of probabilities that you angered a powerful and influential, dishonest and corrupt politician in Venezuela, and you were targeted in Venezuela as a result. I accept that you left Venezuela for fear of being seriously harmed and the threats continued in Mexico.

[9]       I have no reason to doubt the authenticity of the personal documentary evidence that you disclosed, and I find on a balance of probabilities that the evidence supports and corroborates your allegations and I give it significant weight. For example, you disclosed a letter from your former partner in Venezuela and a letter from your mother in Mexico corroborating the core allegations, as well as a number of documents regarding your professional credentials, training, and jobs corroborating your experience as an XXXX along with the two police denunciations that are at the root of all of the threats and assaults against you that you made in Venezuela, and a medical report regarding the first time you were assaulted by the agents of persecution in 2017 in Venezuela.

[10]     I find that you have established a nexus to Section 96 by reason of your imputed political opinion, that being in opposition to the former XXXX who is the XXXX and that you are an opponent of the Government of Venezuela.

[11]     So based on the credibility of your allegations and the objective documentary evidence, I find you ‘ve established there’s a forward-facing risk that you will be subjected to mistreatment and violence at the hands of Venezuelan authorities and their affiliates in both Venezuela and Mexico owing to your Venezuelan anti-government political opinions.

[12]     The fact that you face these risks is corroborated by the documentary evidence provided by you and by the preponderance of the documentary evidence found in the National Documentation Package for Venezuela dated February 28^th  2023, and the National Documentation Package for Mexico dated September 2022.

[13]     For example, Exhibit 2.1 in the Venezuela NDP, 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, Major Human Rights Report, recent Human Rights Reports demonstrate that there continue to be widespread persecution throughout Venezuela against individuals known or suspected of being political opponents of the Madura regime with the government authorities, paramilitaries, Colectivos, and other political supporters targeting opponents of the regime with harassment, denial of services, severe discrimination, incarceration, and physical violence, and killing. The documentary evidence overwhelmingly corroborates that authorities in Venezuela do not tolerate dissent against government and state affiliated armed gangs known as Colectivos routinely commit acts of violence with impunity against civilians involved in anti-government activities such as your

35 denunciations. The situation is described as a continuing human rights crisis with further reports of extrajudicial executions, excessive use of force, and unlawful killings by the security force during the year.

[14]     Item 7.1 in the Venezuela NDP addresses the issue of whistleblowers and says that over the past five years, there have been people fired as a result of exposing corruption in the XXXX and that’s XXXX and there is also a report at page 5 in Exhibit 7.1 of a government employee

who went missing after reporting misconduct of local public officials much like your case. It’ s common for the government in Venezuela to blacklist opponents or revealers of information such as yourself. You were provided a number of news articles corroborating the agent of persecution as being a powerful corrupt career politician who has been involved with the regime in Venezuela XXXX and is now involved with the XXXX recently as the XXXX when you uncovered his criminal activity and now recently as the XXXX, to  XXXX at the times you ‘ve alleged. The preponderance of the evidence in the NDP on Mexico establishes that police at all levels in Mexico are corrupt and collude with cartels and criminals and you have provided documentation regarding the connection between the Venezuelan politicians and the Mexican cartels.

[15]     With regard to the nature of the harm that you would face upon return to Venezuela and Mexico, I find that threats, intimidation, and physical violence at the hands of the agents of persecution clearly amount to persecution.

[16]     With regard to state protection in Venezuela, since the state is the agent of persecution, I find it would be objectively unreasonable for you to seek the protection of the state and therefore find you have rebutted the presumption of state protection in Venezuela.

[17]     In Mexico, the documentary evidence you have provided reveals the Mexico government is in support of the Venezuelan government and further, the documentary evidence in the most recent NDP for Mexico states, is very clear, the preponderance of the evidence is clear that corruption in the police remains a major problem in Mexico and there is little indication of improvement in recent years. For example, Exhibit 10.2 states that organized crime has deeply permeated police institutions at all levels, federal, state, local, in facilitating illegal businesses, working for organized crime, and systematically violating human trust, human rights. There is no trust between the different police forces as municipal and states police have been infiltrated by the drug cartels and are therefore rarely informed of operations led by federal police or the army. There are mechanisms available to report police corruption, yet surveys show that citizens are highly unlikely to file official complaints of corruption and the most cited reasons for doing so are waste of time and fear of reprisals, and that’s found at item 10.2 in the NDP for Mexico.

[18]     So, the documentary evidence establishes that cartels throughout the country aim to dominate, intimidate local politicians and law enforcement in Mexico and infiltrate state authorities and therefore I find that you have rebutted the presumption of state protection in Mexico.

[19]     With regard to an Internal Flight Alternative in Venezuela, I find there is a serious possibility of persecution throughout the whole country given the documentary evidence that the authorities and their affiliates, the laws and the policies operate similarly throughout the entire country and therefore there is no IFA there for you and with regard to an Internal Flight Alternative in Mexico, I find that despite moving to various locations in Mexico, the perpetrators had the means to find you through clandestine networks and therefore they clearly have the motivation to pursue you, they clearly have the means to pursue you. As well, they clearly have the motivation to pursue you as evidenced by the ongoing contact and threats that they have made against your family members throughout Mexico. So, I therefore find there is no viable Internal Flight Alternative for you in Mexico.

[20]     So based on all of these reasons, I find that you are a Convention refugee and I accept your claim.

——— REASONS CONCLUDED ———