JAG BAHADUR CHHANTYAL v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD / NON-REFOULEMENT CLAIMS PETITION OFFICE

CACV 184/2020

[2021] HKCA 346

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CIVIL APPEAL NO 184 OF 2020

(ON APPEAL FROM HCAL NO 1633 of 2018)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon S T Poon J (giving the Judgment of the Court):

1.  On 16 November 2020, this Court (Chu JA, Lisa Wong and S T Poon JJ) handed down our judgment[1] dismissing the applicant’s appeal against the decision of Deputy High Court Judge K.W. Lung given on 5 June 2020 refusing leave to apply for judicial review. The applicant had sought judicial review of the decision of the Torture Claims Appeal Board dismissing his appeal from the decision of the Director of Immigration rejecting his non-refoulement claim.

2.  On 27 November 2020, the applicant filed a notice of motion to apply for leave to appeal against our judgment to the Court of Final Appeal.  He also lodged a written submission to support his application.

3.  Having considered the applicant’s notice of motion and written submissions, we see no reason to depart from the usual practice of determining applications of this kind on paper without a hearing.

4.  In the notice of motion, the applicant put forward the following matters as his proposed grounds of appeal:

“I would like to infomr the Honourable Court that there is some error in law in my decision. Decision maker just relied COL Information and my previous facts which were in favor while rejecting my claim. Acual life occur different situation then what is mentioned in COL information. The Officer and cours prefers to ignore overwhelming of the evidence of this violence towards minorities searching for unrealistic silver lining. The Decision is betrary a bias and formula approach unlikely fairly access the danger of my life and clearly not reasonable.” (sic)

5.  The first three pages of the applicant’s written submissions simply reproduced the skeleton submissions he lodged in support of the appeal before us which we have dealt with in our judgment.  In pages 4 to 5 the applicant claims that the Board acted in a procedurally unfair manner without properly assessing the credibility of the applicant, sets out two passages quoted from cases on the concept of “unreasonableness”, and mentions section 37ZT of Immigration Ordinance (Cap 115) which concerns the late filing of notice of appeal.  It is not clear to us however, and the applicant has not elaborated or explained, how they relate to or assist his application for leave to appeal further.

6.  Under section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance (Cap 484), leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal may be granted if the question involved in the appeal is one which, by reason of its great general or public importance, or otherwise, ought to be submitted to the Court of Final Appeal for decision.  Here, the applicant’s notice of motion and written submissions do not properly identify any error in our judgment, let alone any question of great general or public importance.  The hurdle for obtaining leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal is not met.  Nor is there any reason for leave to be given under the “otherwise” ground in section 22(1)(b).

7.  Accordingly, we dismiss the applicant’s notice of motion.