PM claims visa restrictions deterred travel to Canada

Days after returning from the Canada-CARICOM summit in Ottawa, Prime Minister Dr Ralph Gonsalves has said there was no “legal or factual” reason to prevent him from travelling to Canada, but rather it was the removal of visa-free travel that stood as a deterrent.

“… For donkey years they tell this lie that Ralph can’t go [to] Canada. I simply said that there is nothing legal or factual to stop me from going to Canada. I just had no compelling reason to go and apply for a visa to go because I was fighting Canada all the time to get the wrong-headed removal of the visa-free access for nationals and others in the region. As part of my own struggle in the region, I wasn’t getting involved in going,” Gonsalves said at a press conference from the Cabinet Office on Monday, October 23

Political opponents had surmised that the Prime Minister was “afraid” to travel to Canada because of sexual assault allegations made against him in 2008 by a female Canadian lawyer. The speculation was bolstered by the fact that Gonsalves had not visited the country in more than 15 years.

Canada made the decision to revoke visa free travel back in 2012 due to an sustained flow of asylum claimants according to immigration officials.

Gonsalves told members of the media that the Summit presented a “compelling” reason and he applied for his visa “weeks before” he intended to travel.

He said rather than applying under the Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA), a recently implemented provision which allows holders of a US visa or persons who previously held a Canadian visa to have travel application fast-tracked, he said: “I wanted to go through what every other Vincentian goes through. I wanted to go through this experience of applying for the visa itself because it is a whole heap of questions that you have to answer. It took over two weeks.”

He disclosed he was approved for a Canadian visa which is valid until 2031.

Contrary to previous out-of-state visits where notice is circulated ahead of travel dates by the Government’s press agency, the Agency for Public Information (API), the Prime Minister’s attendance at the Summit was only publicly confirmed when a photo was posted to the Office of the Prime Minister Facebook’s page on October 18. The photo showed Canada’s Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau and PM Gonsalves in an embrace.

“All I was trying to do all the time when I hear the dogs barking, I say their barks will collide with the reality and they got more and more hysterical as the time came closer.

“They will have egg on their face when the first picture appears when I am there hugging up my breddrin Justin Trudeau and making jokes.”

The Prime Minister, along with other Caribbean leaders, attended the Canada-CARICOM Summit which ran from October 17-19.