DIMIA damage control? Blame the victim!
Wednesday July 13th 2005, 10:38 am

Former minister for immigration and well-known lying sack of shit, Phillip Ruddock, is trying a little forward damage control in the media ahead of the release of the Palmer enquiry into DIMIA stuffups with regard to the unlawful incarceration of Cornelia Rau and deportation of Vivian Alvarez.

In an interview on ABC Lateline, Ruddock got stuck straight in to the victim-blame trip, claiming that Vivian Alvarez could have prevented her own deportation but did not notify officials that she was an Australian citizen. Previously, both Ruddock and Amounda Vanstone have both tried to blame Cornelia Rau for her 10 month unlawful imprisonment by DIMIA. Now the lying sack of shit is trying to say that Alvarez willfully concealed her identity and thus her deportation is her own fault.

Sorry folks, but this is 100% bullshit.  It is a basic, basic, BASIC responsibility of any law enforcement agency to establish the identity of those taken into custody and also to establish that there is just and lawful cause to hold the person. When a person is unable (or unwilling) to provide identity information, it is incumbent upon authorities to perform that identification, exhausting all sources of information available, up to and including such esoterica as CrimeStoppers or the local newspapers– where this particular notice regarding the (then) missing Cornelia Rau was printed: 

image: Sydney Morning Herald 

If it is possible for Australian authorities to identify those killed, and in many cases dismembered in the 2002 Bali bombings, it is most certainly possible- and much more easily so- to identify intact, living persons held in custody.

IN FACT, Vivian Alvarez did correctly identify herself to immigration authorities, but did not have her passport in her possession at that instant to prove her claim of citizenship. It’s amazing that she was able to provide even this level of identification, given that she was suffering the aftereffects of a closed head injury sustained in an automobile accident*. Moreover, Australian citizens are not required to carry proof of citizenship with them at all times.  

Quite simply, it was not in the interests of DIMIA to correctly identify people and verify their residency bases. Their job, as instructed by the HoWARd government, was only to incarcerate and deport suspected illegal migrants, not to verify who they really are and whether or not they are legal residents of Australia. 

HoWARd, Ruddock & Vanstone have been using DIMIA as their own private racial police, enforcing a new White Australia policy.

Now it is anticipated that the Palmer Enquiry will not call for a Royal Commission, ensuring that the actual facts of who was calling the shots will be kept quiet- and those truly responsible will not be held accountable for these crimes.

I call BULLSHIT!

It would be fully reasonable to have HoWARd, Ruddock and Vanstone charged with kidnapping!

Don’t allow the HoWARd government to lie their way out of this one… and don’t let the ALP help them do so.

Write paper letters to HoWARd, Beazley, Allison, Brown and to anyone else in your local government, demanding a Royal Commission enquiry into DIMIA- and a response to your letter, in which is described what will be done in the future to stop DIMIA being used as a political weapon against Australians!

-weez 

 

* The cause of Alvarez’s injuries were revealed in the Palmer Report not to be from an automobile accident, but domestic violence. Alvarez was beaten by her husband and was found wandering, injured and destitute, which was her cause for being taken into custody and eventually deported by DIMIA.


9 Comments so far
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“It is a basic, basic, BASIC responsibility of any law enforcement agency to establish the identity of those taken into custody and also to establish that there is just and lawful cause to hold the person.” Exactly!

Comment by Peter F Bradshaw 07.13.05 @ 11:21 am

The failure to identify these people indicates an entrenched racist culture, a truly endemic failure in DIMIA and the way it is politicised.

These women were first deemed to be ‘other,’ not presumed to be Australian until proven otherwise. Their treatment exposes the horrors of the debasing and dehumanising treatment applied to whomever DIMIA determines to be ‘not one of us.’

It’s 2005, not 1965. Australians come in all kinds of packages and with soundtracks from all over the world. I realise that makes it harder for HoWARd, Ruddock, Vanstone and DIMIA to throw out the correct people… they’re not so easy to spot anymore. Damned multiculturalism!

Incidentally, most visa overstayers in Australia are Anglo-European. Brits, Irish, Canadians,
Americans, etc.

Comment by weezil 07.13.05 @ 11:35 am

Give it ten years, and the excuse will be, “It’s your fault, you weren’t carrying your Australia Card.”

Though the fuckers won’t be pushing that piece of police-state bullshit through if I’ve got anything to do with it.

Comment by Flashman 07.13.05 @ 6:32 pm

I second the BULLSHIT call. I’m ashamed that this can happen in Australia.

Comment by poke 07.14.05 @ 2:19 am

“Now the lying sack of shit is trying to say that Alvarez willfully concealed her identity and thus her deportation is her own fault.”

Being a bit harsh on our Phil, Weez. If the damn woman wouldn’t say who she was when she sat the DIMIA dictation test in Urdu.

Dammit Weez, them afro-austro-german darkies are devious buggers what’ll steal the butter that wouldn’t melt out in the mouths of caring sharing Attorney Genitals.

Comment by Flange Desire 07.14.05 @ 4:47 pm

Wow, Guv… I didn’t know Urdu was a European language… 😀

The Attorney Genital needs a little hot belt-sander action. At least then he could feel sorry, if but for himself. What a twat.

Comment by weezil 07.14.05 @ 5:19 pm

“I didn’t know Urdu was a European language.”

We at DIMIA don’t make up the rules, we just misapply them.

Comment by Flange Desire 07.14.05 @ 6:15 pm

Hi Weezil – our blogpal BourbonBird is the niece of Vivian and if you visit her blog she will email you her Behind The News story. link via my blog. cheers.B

Comment by Brownie 07.14.05 @ 9:07 pm

Thanks for that, Brownie. I’ll get on to that today.

Comment by weezil 07.15.05 @ 8:17 am



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