Canada grants Algerian ballet’s members asylum licences

The national ballet’s members were brilliant on Thursday in Montreal in their first show after they had sought asylum in Canada. They made a wonderful show in a refuge centre’s room as part of the New Year celebrations.

• This show comes directly after the group finished with administrative and legal procedures to seek asylum. Each member was given a 5-year-asylum licence to live under the Canadian State’s protection. Their case will be examined and a federal judge of the immigration and citizenship ministry will decide in it.

  The ballet’s members will benefit from health insurance and social allowance while working licence will be issued next month. 
  

  Earlier on Tuesday, they chose a lawyer to be in charge of their case at the immigration department. He asked them to not make any statement to the press and stay away from the light.

  Previously on November 10^th, the ballet’s members presented an artistic show on the Algerian Revolution Day in Montreal. They did not want to come back to Algeria. Because of that, Algerian diplomats tried to convince them to change their mind. Eight of them including a woman missed the trip to their home land after their passports and luggage had been taken from them.

  A Canadian woman hosted two of the members on the run. She knew one of them on the Internet. The others went to their friends in Canada. Few days later, they met in a refuge centre in western Montreal where they stayed for a month.

  Three members are expected to join a Lebanese dancing group as its officials liked their show. All the members are expected to participate in a film in Montreal untitled ‘Halal Butcher’ starting from February.

  “Former director pushed them to immigrate illegally,” says ballet’s member

  The ballet’s member Mahieddine Nacereddine told Echorouk his colleagues refused to come back to Algeria because their former director ill treated them.

  “The former director marginalised the academic competences and the ballet’s old members,” he said.

  “In the terror period, we went to various capitals in the world with a one-year visa. No one of us thought of running away because we felt that we are the sons of this country and this family called the national ballet,” he added.
  

  “I don’t blame them for what they did and I refuse to call them illegal immigrants. We need to wonder why they did not want to come back to Algeria.”
  

  Mahieddine said the former director was practicing administrative terror which turned the ballet from an artistic cultural institution into a corrupted administration. “She forbade documents approbation and she prevented employees from contacting the culture ministry.”
  

  “The ballet turned them into professional dancers,” says former director

  The national ballet’s former director Kaddouri Mbarka denied Mahieddine’s accusations.

  “I did not exercise any sort of marginalisation or exclusion on any one. I respected the interne regulation and I did not prevent any one from contacting the culture ministry,” she told Echorouk.

  “When I was the national ballet’s director, their member’s salaries were raised to 34,000 DZ compared to 12,000. The members on the run in Canada owe to the national ballet their professional performance after they had been without any level,” she added.