Nigerian family to be deported from Canada over fake university acceptance letter

The future of a Nigerian woman, Lola Akinlade and her family in Canada is uncertain following a discovery that she used a fake university acceptance letter to secure a study and work permit.

Akinlade, who graduated from the Nova Scotia Community College in 2019, says she was unaware the letter provided by an agent in Lagos for the University of Regina in 2016 was fake.

All was going well until a few weeks before graduation when Akinlade got a letter from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), informing her that one of the documents she had used to enter Canada in 2016 was fraudulent.

The letter asked her to defend herself.

The international student said she was completely blindsided by this development. She said she and her family were thrown into distress as they had suddenly found themselves with no immigration status in Canada.

Worse still, there is little to fall back on if they return to Nigeria.

Statistics obtained by CBC from IRCC suggest there could be many other international students in Canada in a similar situation.

It was gathered that the IRCC began a new process to screen international student acceptance letters in December 2023.

The more rigorous screening of documents has detected more than 9,000 examples of fake letters supplied by international students who ultimately got admitted into Canada.

Akinlade is now appealing to the IRCC to review her case on the basis that she was a victim of a “rogue agent” who supplied her with a fake letter of acceptance to a Canadian school.

Akinlade, who holds a business administration degree from a Nigerian university said she started thinking about studying in Canada in 2015.

At the time, she was working for a pharmaceutical company in Lagos as a medical sales representative.

She recalled that she met with a man who said he worked as an immigration consultant at an office outside Lagos. She said the man promised to guide her through the process of becoming an international student by applying for a master’s degree in business administration.

The Nigerian student said she had no particular institution in mind. She only told the agent she wanted to study at a high-quality Canadian institution.

According to her, the agent asked for some documents, such as her passport and university transcripts, and payment.

A few months later, the agent called her to inform her he had secured a study permit for her to enter Canada. She collected this, plane tickets and an acceptance letter to the University of Regina.

With all the necessary documents in her possession, Akinlade and her family flew to Canada in late December 2016, believing she would start classes in January 2017.

Akinlade further recalled that while she was staying over in Winnipeg en route to Regina, the agent called to inform her that there were no spaces available at the university and she would have to go on a waitlist.

She then told him she would not be on a waitlist as her aim was to start studying immediately.

She said she then started to search for a new school and a new program and stayed with relatives in Winnipeg until she was accepted at the Nova Scotia Community College for Social Services for a September 2017 start.

Explaining the switch to social sciences, she said it aligned more with the work she had done in the medical field.

Akinlade said there was no contact between her and the University of Regina until two years later, when IRCC told her the acceptance letter included in her application was fake.

She said she did not believe the letter as she believed it might have been a miscommunication.

However, a call to the institution confirmed that the letter was indeed fraudulent.

Akinlade said since arriving in Canada she had had little contact with the agent in Nigeria.

CBC communicated with the agent, Babatunde Isiaq Adegoke, who admitted he guided Akinlade through the process of applying to enter Canada.

Adegoke also admitted to supplying the fake acceptance letter to the University of Regina but disclosed that he also obtained the letter from a company called Success Academy Education Consult that he hired.

As to the whereabouts of the company, he disclosed that it was located in the city of Ejigbo but has since moved to an unknown location.

Akinlade said he also did not know that the letter was fraudulent and did not tell Akinlade she would have to go on the waitlist at the University of Regina.

Adegoke reportedly told CBC he was no longer offering study permit services, and could no longer reach Success Academy Education Consult.

He reportedly said he last dealt with the company in 2018.

When requested to do a video call for more information, he declined.

CBC’s attempt to find a business that matched Adegoke’s description proved abortive. CBC, nonetheless, contacted via phone and emails, other businesses with similar names. None of them said they recognized Lola Akinlade’s letter.

The fate of Akinlade and her family continues to hang in the balance, as she lost her study permit in Canada and was denied when she attempted to apply for a post-graduate work permit. Her temporary resident permit application was also denied.

In March 2023, she got a letter from An IRCC officer telling her the department believed she knew the document was fake.

Akinlade’s husband, Samson and her eight-year-old Nigerian-born son, David, who joined her in Nova Scotia in 2018 have lost their temporary resident status.

Their younger son holds Canadian citizenship, having been born in Canada in 2021. He, however, does not have medical coverage because of his parents’ status.

Akinlade, her husband and older son have now been asked to leave Canada voluntarily. They are not allowed to work or go to school.

Akinlade said the family had been surviving on their savings and the situation was getting more critical.

To secure the funds to travel to Canada to study, the family had to sell their home in Nigeria.

Before she lost her immigration status, Akinlade and her husband were caregivers in Nova Scotia.

She said she and her husband had invested their lives in Canada and had nothing to return to in Nigeria.

The family is now exploring the angle of filing for an application to stay on humanitarian grounds, according to their lawyer, Amanat Sandhu.

Sandhu told CBC her firm frequently came across situations where “rogue agents” supplied immigrants with bad information.