From there, the Senate Inquiry turned to parts of the Auditor General’s Visa report which singles out and questions Ruth Meighan’s management of the Department in the way visas and permanent residency applications were being handled. That’s where, as we told you, Asian applicants were able to get approval for visas, and with lightning speed, they were then able to get permanent residency – which they didn’t legally qualify for. Some of those applicants got their visas approved, and in only a matter of days, and in some instances, a matter of hours, their nationality certificates and passports were being printed. 

Auditor General Dorothy Bradley report points to an instance where 15 applicants received this sort of rapidito service, and her team’s investigation pointed directly Ruth Meighan as the most senior Immigration Officer in the Department. Here’s the tough questions they had for her:

Hon. Aldo Salazar - Chairman, Senate Select Committee
"In looking at A1 deal with the issue of permanent residency, which I believe is not - the period of time required for somebody to be issued a resident status in Belize is set as 1 year. You must be living in Belize for the period of a 1 year, and that is not policy as far as I understand it. That's a legal requirement. So, if you look at that table, what the Auditor General is saying there is that these 15 individuals were granted permanent residency within a period less than a year after their visas were issued. So, it would have been impossible for them to met the legal requirement to be in Belize for a year. And if you would look at the 5th column, saying the first one. It says accepted by Miss Ady Pacheco, approved by Miss Ruth Meighan; 2nd, accepted by Miss Ady Pacheco, approved by Ms. Ruth Meighan; 3rd, approved by Ms. Ruth Meighan; 4th, approved by Ms. Ruth Meighan; 5th, approved by Ms. Ruth Meighan; 6th, approved by Miss Ruth Meighan; 8th, approved by Ms. Ruth Meighan; 9, approved by you as well; 10, approved by you, 13, 14, and 15. Can you give us any insight as to how you would have come to approve the granting of permanent residency status to an individual who had not been in Belize for a period of 1 year, at least?"

Ruth Meighan - Former Director of Immigration
"The application for permanent residency comes in a file that has photocopy records of the applicant, and on that file, they indication from the officer says that the person has been living in Belize for the 1 year period as specified, and within that you, you would have the passport of that individual, with the stamp of entry and other permits that were issued, and it's based on that information that is presented, that is what we use to give approval."

Hon. Aldo Salazar
"So, you're saying that - well, what the Auditor General did - I'm assuming, they say we shouldn't assume but I'll take the liberty of doing so. I'm saying that what the Auditor General did was to compare the visa issuance records with the records for permanent residency, and the it revealed that there wasn't sufficient time for that person to have -"

Ruth Meighan
"Well, what I have was not the visa issuance record, what I had was an application file with a passport completely photocopied with the pages indicated on the file saying (for example) Ruth Meighan entered on this date, has sometimes, work permit stamps in there. And based on that, it shows over a period time, that the person has been in Belize. That is the-"

Hon. Aldo Salazar
"So, you're saying that you would have seen a passport with a stamp indicating that the person was in Belize for a period in excess of a year."

Ruth Meighan
"Of a year, yes."

Hon. Aldo Salazar
"Even, well, the Auditor General is saying that the person could not have been here for a year."

Ruth Meighan
"Yeah."

Hon. Aldo Salazar
"So, the stamp would have had to have been a forgery, a fraud?"

Ruth Meighan
"Obviously."