Ottawa | Thursday
A JOHANNESBURG family plagued by a rare medical condition that makes three of its four members allergic to sunshine had its latest bid to stay in Canada turned down, immigration officials said this week.
John and Maggie Viviers came to Canada as tourists with their two children — Dominic, now 15, and Heloise, now 13 — in April 1999. They intended to settle in the country’s rainiest town, Prince Rupert.
The father and the two children have the hereditary condition called porphyria, which makes even brief exposures to sunlight painful.
Maggie Viviers, the only family member who does not have porphyria, said she was ”frustrated and disappointed” by the immigration department’s dismissal of their application for permanent residence on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.
The dismissal was the outcome of an appeal against a ruling, made nearly two years ago, ordering the family to leave or be deported.
The original ruling noted that the family had entered the country on visitors’ visas.
Viviers has said a permanent residence application would have required disclosure of the medical condition. His family might then have been considered a potential burden on the health care system and denied entry.
Senior immigration officer Elisabeth Klak, author of this week’s decision, said, ”I am not satisfied that returning to South Africa represents an undue, unreasonable or disproportionate hardship” for the family. They could apply again from there.
Maggie said that in South Africa her children would ”never live a normal life again,” unable to go out except at night.
Rain-drenched Prince Rupert, a remote fishing port in the north of British Columbia province, had vastly improved the family’s health, she said. Her husband and their children ”lived a normal life for the first time” and never needed to see a doctor about porphyria since their arrival.
Townspeople have offered them money, jobs and clothes. About 3 500 signed a petition asking the immigration minister to let the Viviers stay.
Their lawyer, Catherine Sas, said the Viviers would lodge another appeal. – Sapa