The news that Manus Island queue-jumping, fake refugee Behrouz Boochani, who is an “excluded person” according to the Australian government, now has refugee status should not really surprise anyone. Jacinda just waved her magic wand. Voila!

Immigration NZ said in November 2019 Behrouz Boochani would be receiving “no special treatment”. Another press release on TVNZ that month said specifically INZ “wouldn’t be extending his visitor’s visa”.

But the PM would not be denied. As we all know the PM had been advocating ad nauseam, since November 2017 for Manus Island (fake) refugees to come to New Zealand, driving Kiwis and Australian authorities crazy.

My, what a difference eight months made.  As they say, ‘It’s not what you know but who you know’, and this goes to the very top. I give you newly minted, queue jumping, fake refugee, Behrouz Boochani, who has found his voice, buoyed by MSM support, using bully boy tactics to attack anyone who has the temerity to question his status. In particular, the National Party, who have been speaking out about the legitimacy of this decision.

Like the Sroubek case, INZ, who were on track to do the right thing, suddenly did a U-turn after instructions from on high and cut a few corners to achieve the PM’s heart’s desire: her very own Manus Island refugee. Queue jumping and fake, but, near enough!

Former Immigration Minister Ian Lees-Galloway must have found himself terribly compromised working in this sort of atmosphere. The old saying ‘you can’t do right for doing wrong’ springs to mind.

Stuart Smith, National’s spokesperson, Immigration says:

“I have criticised this decision and the decision to grant him a visitor’s visa in the first place. There are Afghani and Iranian nationals with extensive travel histories who have been declined visitor visas solely because of the risk of an asylum claim and yet Mr Boochani who is a known asylum seeker is granted a visa. 

“In addition Mr Boochani’s history and statements from the Australian Government it would suggest that he is an excluded person, but INZ failed to check with the Australian Government to confirm his status.

“This is an incredible oversight given that under Section 15 of the Immigration Act 2009 it states that anyone who has been deported or is an excluded person from another Country cannot be issued a visa,”

I am concerned that the government (surreptitiously) has approved Behrouz Boochani’s refugee status, whilst it is preventing people like hard-working dairy workers with employment contracts on farms from returning to New Zealand (post lockdown) to work during the busy calving season.

These essential workers lauded by the government during lockdown are now discarded in favour of mates in the film industry, a highly questionable refugee, and a ‘renowned’ epidemiologist’ from the US. An epidemiologist moreover who will write favourably about Ardern’s COVID response and get it printed by all the usual local and international media suspects leading up to the election. 

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I did my writing apprenticeship as a communications advisor. Like all writers, I am highly opinionated, so freelance writing is best for me. I abhor moral posturing, particularly by NZ politicians. I avoid...