And Ashburn's fraudulent immigration office is only one in a number of related incidents. This year we have seen discrepancies as it relates to fake passports and allegations against immigration officers - who were reported to have facilitated human smuggling.
But the PM insists that he runs a tight ship, and when any such report reaches his desk, he ensures a full investigation is done. He explained that it is necessary for them to follow the proper procedures to avoid litigation.
John Briceno, Prime Minister
"As the Minister of Immigration it is my duty to see that we keep a ministry that is functioning properly, that we're doing the right thing, that we follow the law, that we're not breaking the law so my policy has been a strict one that whenever we find anyone that does anything out of the way, anything illegal that we need to deal with them, we pass it on to the police and then we have to follow the process. There was an unfortunate instance with one person that was issuing false receipts and unfortunately we did not follow the right process, we went straight to the Public Service Commission. The Public Service Commission rejected that and said you can't fire the person because you did not have natural justice, going to the person and letting him respond before you go to the public service and so if they were to be fired, they would go to court and win the case, even though, and that's what I find, it's infuriating that even though you have the evidence. So what we have done with that person, I said well that person cannot stay in the Ministry of Immigration so we worked with public service and we removed him from there and I hope if that person slips again, they can follow due process and get rid of them. We don't need those kinds of people in the service of the government. So I use that as an example to say that wherever we find any wrongdoing, we go after them. With the issue of the fraudulent stamps, when it was brought to my attention, I immediately told the Commissioner of Police go after them, I don't care who is involved, any person, they have to be held accountable. As to the fraudulent passports, we're still trying to find out how that happened, who is responsible, but the moment that we have information that we can present to you, we're going to present it to you. The point that I try to make and I wish that members of the media would understand, we have a job to do, we just can't be running to media, oh we have this. We need to investigate properly because when we do that then we jeopardize the process and we don't want to do that."
But with several incidents occurring in a short span of time since he took over the portfolio, does it reflect on the minister himself?
Not surprisingly, the PM doesn't think so - in fact he found it appalling that we would even consider the possibility.
Courtney Menzies:
"Don't you think the frequency of the instances though reflect badly on you as the minister?"
John Briceno, Prime Minister
"Why would you say that? How dare you say that? What frequency? Look at what happened in the previous government, how could you ever say that? Honestly? Really? And that is what is upsetting, when you just try to sensationalize stuff. Let's be real, let's be fair, let's be honest as journalists. What you see now is nothing compared to what you saw before. And I have to give credit to Minister Courtenay when he was there, he started ensuring that we started to put all of these processes in place and I am picking up where he left to finish up the term. But for you to use loosely- be fair, that's all I ask, be fair journalists. The point is and I repeat, anything that we find out of the ordinary we will going after them. I don't care who it is. One of them was a good supporter of one of my colleagues and I said, I don't care, we are going to deal with these people."
