Drastic cuts to Canadian refugee numbers
Canada is cutting the number of applications private sponsors can make by over half. Why?
On January 27, Fosiyo Iye Fidow heard that all flights for refugees travelling from Kenya to Canada are cancelled. All refugees waiting for flights have been asked to wait until further notice, and no reason was given.
Fosiyo’s application to come to Canada was approved in June 2023. All requirements have been met: security checks, health checks, vaccinations. Yet her family is still waiting for visas to actually leave Kenya and come here. To her Canadian sponsors, this feels as though not only are refugee numbers being cut, but also the process even for approved applicants is being slowed down.
Six hundred refugees, waiting
In November 2025, the Canadian government announced cuts to the number of refugees allowed into the country. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) told Sponsorship Agreement Holders (SAHs), many of which are church denominations, that a 54 percent cut would be made to the number of applications SAHs have available for private sponsorships in 2026.
“This announcement follows a 20 percent cut that we faced in 2025,” says Jacqueline Derrah, who handles sponsorships for the Atlantic Baptist churches.
Earlier, IRCC had already limited the various ways in which private sponsorships could be done. For example, the Group of Five or Community Sponsor streams were paused indefinitely.
“We have several groups that typically sponsor through us each year,” said Derrah in her email message to various sponsorship groups. “We acknowledge that this will create stress for you and the people that you are wanting to sponsor, many of whom are in urgent need of safety.”
Derrah has a waiting list of about six hundred individuals for whom applications have been requested by various local churches. Only thirty-five to fifty people will make the list this year. This leaves serious questions about which refugees need to be prioritized. Who is in the most danger? Who has high medical needs that could be addressed in Canada?
Fosiyo’s family
The refugee committee I currently chair wants to bring Fosiyo Iye Fidow and her large family to Canada. Early in 2022, we began working with Kings Presbyterian Church in New Minas, Nova Scotia, and with Nimo, Fosiyo’s sister, as co-sponsor, using the Presbyterian Church of Canada (PCC) as our SAH. Both Nimo and Fosiyo grew up in Dagahaley, a sub-camp of the huge Dadaab camp in Kenya, where many Somali refugees live. Both sisters married and gave birth to children. Their mother, Maryan, along with Nimo and her husband and three little boys, came to Canada more than seven years ago, sponsored by two small Baptist churches. An adult nephew lives near Kentville, now married with two children. The current effort is aimed at family reunification, which used to be a factor in Canada’s choice of refugees permitted into the country.
As for those new cuts, our committee has already been looking to sponsor yet another family once Fosiyo and her family arrive. Is there any hope that another family will ever make it to the PCC’s much reduced list?
Whose fault?
During his tenure as prime minister, Justin Trudeau opened the floodgates for immigrants, allowing more than a million people to enter the country annually. This was intended to stimulate economic growth and supply much needed labour. Not incidentally, bringing in young families would also alleviate the demographic crunch of an aging population. No provision was made to build sufficient infrastructure to support this decision: no extra housing was built and health care capacity was already insufficient. And whose fault was this?
Canada appears to be blaming the very immigrants that were so recently welcomed with open arms. Polls show that citizens are increasingly opposed to more newcomers, while the IRCC’s cuts make obvious the government’s change of policy, initially made to enhance Trudeau’s chance of survival at the top. Politics is about votes, and doesn’t necessarily consider archaic writings about feeding the hungry and sheltering the homeless.
Where does this leave the world’s refugees?
According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, “As of the end of June 2025 . . . 117.3 million people had been forced to flee their homes globally due to persecution, conflict, violence, human rights violations or events seriously disturbing public order. Among them were nearly 42.5 million refugees. In addition, there were 67.8 million people displaced within the borders of their own countries and 8.42 million asylum-seekers.”
With international aid slashed in recent months, the United Nations is no longer able to supply the services available in the past. As a result, we’ve already been paying for rent and food since Fosiyo’s family moved to Nairobi for necessary appointments that we hope will get them here. We have a house waiting for Fosiyo and her family. We can only hope it will still be available when the family finally arrives.
