Abdoul Abdi is a free man, but still not a Canadian according to the federal government. Lawyer Benjamin Perryman announced on Monday that his client will be released from custody, by order of the Immigration and Refugee Board, and sent to a halfway house in the greater Toronto area while he fights to remain in […]
immigration
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Trudeau offers platitudes but no promises on Abdoul Abdi’s case
“Abdoul Abdi needs to be free!” came the chants of a small crowd of protesters outside Sackville High School on Tuesday night. The protesters aimed their cries at the sprawling line waiting to attend prime minister Justin Trudeau’s town hall event in hopes of raising awareness about the deportation case of Somalian refugee Abdoul Abdi. […]
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Small town, global minds
Helen Timbo, 21Dalhousie University, third-year, statistics and chemistryOriginally from Sierra Leone, Timbo’s lived in Halifax for eight years and is the current president of the Dalhousie African Student Association. Her first taste of Halifax was when she arrived in the winter of 2008. “When the cold hit me, I screamed and didn’t want to go […]
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Trudeau’s refugee cap undervalues Canadian values
Embed from Getty Images On a cold windless January night, Kate McKenna walked into a meeting to consider, with some hesitance, sponsoring a Syrian refugee family to move to Nova Scotia. “Don’t commit to too much,” she reminded herself, as she joined a small group in the gym of the St. James Parish Hall in […]
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Editing the way journalists write about social justice
[Image-1] Media “significantly shapes public opinion,” says Naiomi Metallic, so the way reporters write about marginalized communities has an impact on them. “The media has not been neutral in its history of how it deals with Indigenous people,” says the Mi’kmaw lawyer and assistant professor at Dalhousie. Metallic was one of three panelists at a […]
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Jennifer Watts takes job with ISANS
[Image-1] Halifax Peninsula North councillor Jennifer Watts already has a gig lined up for after October’s municipal election. Watts will join the Immigrant Services Association of Nova Scotia (ISANS) as its new director of settlement and integration in November. “I always said I was looking for work,” says the two-term councillor (who is not re-offering). […]
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An Irish citizen’s notes on Halifax
[Image-1] “If you think this snow is bad, you should have seen it last year!” were some of the first words I was greeted with upon landing at Halifax on December 29, 2015. Shrugging on my shiny new ski jacket (Irish weather rarely calls for such extreme attire) I joined the queue for the sprinkling […]
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How long is someone labelled a Come From Away?
[Image-1] We were looking for a metaphor that would make it more understandable for others to comprehend what immigrants are going through in the beginning, and we came up with this: Imagine that you came into a shiny prom, pleasant yet unfamiliar music is played and all dancers are arranged in pairs or groups. They […]
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This man is building a farm in his backyard for new Canadians
[Image-1] From the front it looks like any ordinary house on Flamingo Drive, but in behind there’s an acre of land Mel Slade has turned into a community farm. This is Beatonridge Gardens. In its short life, this community garden has become a touch point for Canadians new and old. Currently there are 12 international […]
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Everything you can wear to a citizenship ceremony
[Image-1] Despite continued Conservative efforts to ban the niqab during citizenship ceremonies, there remain precious few government regulations stopping prospective new Canadians from wearing tacky political branding and hideous corporate swag. According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada, there are no dress requirements for new Canadians attending their citizenship ceremony beyond “business casual.” Applicants may also […]
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Thursday’s 6 things you need to know
1 When the Macdonald Bridge was built 60 years ago it linked two distinct cities. Nowadays, it’s a part of the Halifax Regional Municipality but our two harbour bridges are still run by a strange authoritative body in the Halifax-Dartmouth Bridge Commission. As the Big Lift lifts off, this week’s Coast cover story looks at […]
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Fifteen years of medical training and unable to work
[Image-1] Mahmoud Alkhatib is washing dishes at home in Clayton Park. A glass breaks and slices open his right hand, blood bursting forth. It’s a long cut, one that can’t be treated with a bandage and rubbing alcohol. He has to go to the hospital. Arriving at the emergency room, he gets in a line […]