Accra, Ghana – The dreams of a Liberian national Myer Konwroh Wreh, born February 15, 1967, his wife (Edith T. Wreh) and his nine other dependents to live permanently in Canada have been shattered.
“The Canadian Embassy in Ghana denied my family from travelling to Canada and have told me I won’t be allowed into Canada for five years,” Mr. Wreh told me in Monrovia, Liberia’s capital, in June, 2016.
A stranger—to later introduce himself as Myer K. Wreh—walked toward me after I introduced myself as a journalist at a program organized by a group of former Liberian refugees in Ghana, and said to me, “Hello, Mr. Journalist, I have a traumatizing issue which I want to discuss with you.”
Throughout the discussion, his physiognomy revealed a deeper emotional wound, and most of his comments were punctuated by sighs and groans.
He was in a suit (short trouser and short-sleeve shirt) torn at different points, and he held a small old traveler’s bag that contained several papers with information as proofs of what he was about to tell me.
Myer told me his family’s problem was engendered by a DNA results that showed that two of the children on the application form were not Myer’s biological offspring, contrary to the information he had given to the Canadian Embassy. Regina Torh was given as name of the children’s biological mother.
“The Canadian Embassy told me that the DNA revealed that the two children, Maxwell and Janice, were not connected to me by blood,” Mr. Wreh said.
The Canadian High Commission’s two-page communication on the DNA results was sent by [email protected] on Monday, June 1, 2015, at 5:40 AM EDT.
Parts of the communication (with Subject: EP00063805), reads: “Dear Myer Kronwroh Wreh: … This refers to your application for permanent residence in Canada as member of the Provincial Nominee Class.
Your application and all of the documents you submitted in support of it have been reviewed and it appears you may not meet the requirements for immigration to Canada.
There was concern that you did not disclose the true biological parents of Maxwell Sarba-Torh Wreh and Janice Plorgbe-Torh Wreh and DNA was requested.
The DNA results dated April 30, 2015 confirm that you are not the biological father of the two dependants. The probability of paternity is 0%…”
However, the High Commission gave Mr. Myer another chance. “The Embassy asked me if I wanted to continue the process. I said, ‘Yes’. I told them to drop the two children and continue the process.”
But, the High Commission August 13, 2015 sent a denial letter, “in spite of my communication already with them on the dropping of the children,” Myer complained.
On the High Commission’s August 13 denial letter, Myer met his Lawyer, Counselor-At-Law, Sylvester D. Rennie, of Legal Watch, Inc., based in Monrovia, to prepare a letter asking the High Commission to rescind their decision. The lawyer’s intervention letter was sent, via e-mail, September 1, 2015.
On September 8, 2015, the Canadian High Commission replied to Myer’s letter, via his Lawyer, asking him to send a new application.
“I obeyed, but the Embassy rejected the new application,” Myer reported.
On June 7, 2016, at 1:41AM, Mr. Wreh’s sister and representative, Mrs. Mrs. Martha C. Newray, complained, via an e-mail, to Mr. Doug Eyolfson, of the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), about the Ghana-based Canadian High Commission’s rejection of her brother’s application.
Mr. Eyolson replied at 2:12PM of the same day Myer’s sister wrote. Part of the reply-mail states: “Hello, Martha, … Myer was sent a procedural fairness letter on June 1, 2015 …. the Procedural fairness letter was Myer’s opportunity to provide opportunity of an explanation of what happened, and any document and information that could change the office’s decision … to deny Myer’s application and ban with from Canada for five years…”
On June 25 Myer Wreh wrote the Canadian High Commission in Ghana on the paternity of Maxwell Sarba-Torh Wreh and Janice Plorgbe-Torh Wreh, expressing his “shock, astonishment, disappointment”, and argued that “there should be some kind of error with the DNA testing or the wrong sample must have been used.”
Maxwell and Janice came from one mother, Regina Torh, Myer’s former fiancé.
The former refugee in Ghana, now based in his native country, said the Canadian High Commission did not apply justice in dealing with his case as the issue of paternity is concern. “Only the woman knows who the real father of a child is.
When she was pregnant, Regina told me I was the father of the pregnancy and I accepted. I performed my paternal responsibility by having the children’s names on the Application Form. ”
Myer raised another issue against the Canadian High Commission in Ghana. He narrated: “They permitted my two dependants, one girl and two boys, to apply separately for the Manitoba Provincial Nominee Program because they were above age 21 at the time, but they granted visas to the boys and denied visa to the girl.
What the Canadian Embassy said, implicitly, about Rachel, is she won’t be economically established in Canada.”
Part of the denial letter to Rachel from the High Commission of Canada, dated September 15, 2015, states:
“Dear Raachel Kapeh Teta Wreh – I am not satisfied that the fact that you are named in a certificate issued by Manitoba is a sufficient indicator that you are likely to be economically established in Canada. I have reached conclusion your father as Manitoba Provincial Nominee has been refused”.
“From the last part of the denial letter, you can understand that Rachel was rejected because she was closer to me by blood. If the Canadian Embassy or the Canadian government wanted to apply justice, they would have treated the three people the same way,” Mr. Wreh argued.
Names of the boys, who are now in Canada, according to Mr. myer wreh, are Anthony Targbe (his nephew) and Alphonso J. Kollie (his half-brother).
Myer had been living far from Regina—he in Ghana and she in Liberia—for a long time after their last intimacy on which Regina would hang the pregnancy on his neck. “I was between Ghana and Liberia, doing business to support the pregnancy and to meet other family’s needs,” he told me.
With Application Number UCI: 89474373 and File number EP00063805, BO 0605554491, Myer was travelling on the Province of Manitoba (MB) Skill Workers Program in Canada.
“A job was waiting for me, and it still is, in Canada from which I would secure a brighter future for my children,” Myer told me, and showed me a photocopy of a letter from one Ralph Regehr, Chief Executive Office of a Company named Woodland Supply & MFG.LTD, located at 867, Meleod Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba, with phone number, (204) 668-0079. The letter was written September 21, 2015.
The heaviest emotional load of the travel denial is on Maximore J. Wreh, born May 20, 1995, his father told me.
“He has attempted suicide once by taking an overdose of pressure-easing drugs, which was later discovered as Valium, because his friends are laughing at him on the travel denial,” Myer relayed his son’s nurtured plan to me.
“He has told his friends several times that he would be in Canada in few weeks; but the Embassy’s denial has turned him into a joker to his friends.”
The travel was being facilitated by Mr. Wreh’s biological sister, Mrs. Martha C. Newray, who served as the Myers’ representative in Canada.
In her latest letter in June, 2016, addressed to Honorable Johnson McCallum, Minister of Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship, Canada, Mrs. Newray appealed for the reduction of the five-year barring period for Mr. Wreh to Canada to one year, arguing that “no way Myer would have known this woman passed onto his (sic) another man’s pregnancy” and that “Liberian men always believes (sic), trust whatever his (sic) Lover tells him (sic).”
In the same letter, Mrs. Newray reiterated her brother’s assertion of suicide attempt by her nephew Maximore J. Wreh. “His son tried to commit suicide fortunately he was caught on time.”
Myer told me he has stronger points against the Canadian High Commission’s “unfair and shocking decision” and believes the points would speak to the reasoning of those who disqualified his family from travelling to Canada and said he would not enter the country for five years.
“These are my points,” he announced. “Point number one: In a relationship, who determines the pregnancy of the woman? Is it the woman or the man? Point number two:
Assuming I was travelling on the Manitoba Provincial Skills Program, and the two children’s mother discovered their names were omitted, and she wrote the Canadian Embassy that I am abandoning my kids, Maxwell and Janice, what would be the Embassy’reaction to my action—omission of the children’s names on application form?
Point number three: If I were in Canada and sent for the two children, and the DNA proved that they are not my biological offspring, will the Canadian government deport me?”
On June 13, 2016, I sent an e-mail to the Canadian High Commission in Ghana, requesting their response to Mr. Myer K. Wreh’s claims.
The High Commission replied on the same date: “We will review your message shortly. If the information is requested is available or our websites or your application is still within standard processing times, we will not provide a response to your message.”
Samuel G. Dweh/Freelance Journalist,
886-618-906/776-583-266/[email protected]