NZ's immigration balancing act

ONE of the virtues of a New Zealand passport is the way it gets its hold ers into most countries on earth visa free.

Practically no one - not even Australians seem to object to Kiwis and consequent ly tens of thousands of New Zealanders are scattered around the world.

Now people are beginning to worry that too many New Zealanders are leaving and the country is under populated.

This has co-incided with a series of monumental government policy blunders which stopped the flow of migrants enter ing the country at a time of a thriving ecno my and, ominiously, is giving the country a reputation for official racism.

The policy failures have seen the mainly Asian market of the past dry up, although India, Pakistan and Bangladesh have become new sources of migrants.

Unannounced, and unofficial, it has now become much easier for Fiji Indians to get work permits to New Zealand and immigra tion overstayers from the Pacific Islands are much less likely to be put on planes back home. New Zealand has not only taken on Kosovo refugees - it is positively encourag ing a number to stay.

New Zealand needs people.

Former Prime Minister David Lange has turned his hand to television documentary making and recently slammed the way New Zealand was dealing with immigration.

He unveiled government policy which lets in people from Asia who have high uni versity qualifications but refuses to allow them to then practice their professions.

He spoke with Taiwanese women in tears, he referred to them as “immigration widows”, whose husbands have been refused the right or practice crafts here and who have gone back to Taiwan leaving their families here.

He revealed Somalian refugee men who had more than one wife being forced to select a single wife to bring here.

He also hammered the refugee policy

which was brining in dozens of people and then putting them on unemployment queues.

“During the programme I will tell you about the chaos that is New Zealand’s immigration policy,” he said.

He said he wondered how dumb New Zealand was.

“Why do we bring people here and expect them to integrate here without giv ing them the means to communicate, to speak English, to be understood. Its worse than dumb, its down right inhumane.”

Lange said New Zealand was undergo ing “its most dramatic ethnic reworkings”.

“I believe if we don’t create a sensible immigration strategy we could well create a racial powder keg which could blow up in our faces.”

“We don’t just welcome refugees, we court the best and the brightest from throughtout the world. People come here, highly qualified, reasonably expecting to get a job. And the run flat against this extra ordinary, self-seving racially sensitive, old boys elite of the professional classes that deny them that chance.”

The programme focused on a Bangladeshi gynaecologist, Fatami Ashrafi, qualified in Britain, the United States, Ireland and Austria but reduced to deliver ing advertising fliers here for the last three years. The Medical Council of New Zealand refuses to recognise here qualifica tions.

Lange asked her whether the treatment she was receiving had anything to do with her race.

“The fact that doctors from Third World countries are treated differently, I cant answer why they do it, I would say it is discrimination,” she said.

“I feel too embarrassed to say that in this modem age, that somebody would discrim inate on the basis of colour.”

She said the Medical Council was an old boys club, “so primative, and so frightened, Continued overleaf

From previous page they are so insecure they want to keep peo ple out.” Lange said Fatami’s “crime” was that her first degree was from a Third World country although she had better qualifica tions than white people who practicised here from England.

He referred to doctors here “as the med ical mafia”.

Lange said the diversity of people was creating a melting pot that could provide a terrific feast “but if we are not prepared the pot could boil over.”

Interestingly a migrant from Fiji might offer hope that the country can steer clear of racial problems.

Dr Rajen Prasad is Race Relations Conciliator and has begun touring New Zealand to talk with as many communities

as possible about a vision on race relations.

He said the time was right for New Zealand to start discussions on race rela tions because of the country’s rapidly

changing ethnic composition.

Census figures reveal that in 1996 European New Zealanders made up 72 per cent of the 3.5 million population, with indigenous Maori at 14 per cent, Pacific Islanders at five per cent, Asians at four per cent and other ethnic groups making up five per cent. By 2026, Statistics New Zealand estimates Europeans will drop to 58 per cent of the population, while Maori increase to 18 per cent, Pacific Island to nine per cent and Asians to 10 per cent.

By 2046, Europeans will represent only half of New Zealand’s population, while other groups continue to increase - Maori to one fifth, and Pacific Islanders and

Asians to 12 per cent each.

“There is a real concern that people won’t know how to cope with this increas

ing diversity,” he says.

Like Lange, he worries about the way immigration is becoming a problem and the way politicians turn the “tap on from time to time. There’s no long term plan.”

Last year Immigration Minister Tuariki Delamere said New Zealand needed an extra 12,000 immigrants. The policy, to balance for comings and goings, required a target of 38,000 migrant approvals this year but it is unlikely this will be met.

Delamere, who came into Parliament with the anti-immigration party New Zealand First and is now an aimless inde pendent likely to lose his seat at the next election, appears to have lost grip of his

portfolio. ■