In today’s headlines with Chereè Kinnear, David Seymour outlines expectations for Pharmac, new speed-camera signage and Tenacious D world tour gets halted.
A 31-year-old Filipino woman who has a 1-year-old New Zealand-born daughter with a 58-year-old citizen has won her battle to stay in New Zealand.
“We can confirm that Charity Valdez has been granted a resident visa based on her partnership,” said Immigration New Zealand’s acting operations director (Northern/Pacific) Chris Adamson.
told us the good news that Immigration NZ has approved my visa. I was just so happy, I broke down and cried.
Charity Valdez and Jojo Velasco say they can now focus on being a family with their 1-year-old daughter Charmaine. Photo / Jason Oxenham
“Obviously they were tears of joy,” she said.
“After two and half years of fighting, and after countless sleepless nights, it just feels surreal that I will be officially allowed to stay with my baby girl and husband.”
Valdez comes from a village in Ifugao, a rural mountain province in the Philippines where she worked as a teacher.
She came to New Zealand from the Philippines in 2019 on a partnership visa with a previous partner who she claimed ill-treated her.
After leaving that relationship she married Velasco, a New Zealand citizen also originally from the Philippines, in 2021 and they have a 1-year-old daughter, Charmaine.
Immigration NZ initially declined her partnership visa application because it did not believe her relationship with Velasco was genuine.
Charity Valdez battled more than two years to get her residence visa to stay in New Zealand with husband Jojo Velasco and 1-year old daughter Charmaine. Photo / Jason Oxenham
She said failure to secure the visa would have almost certainly split the family, as there was no way her husband would have been able to adjust to life in the mountain village.
Valdez and Velasco met in 2020 when he was a customer at the Albany sushi shop where she worked.
She obtained a new employer-sponsored work visa before applying for a partnership visa supported by Velasco, which was declined.
After a successful Immigration and Protection Tribunal (IPT) appeal against deportation, she lodged a residence visa application in September 2023 - but when her work visa expired, Immigration NZ refused to grant her an interim visa to await its decision on her residence visa.
The agency also said it was concerned Valdez may have provided misleading information in a previous application.
Immigration NZ initially did not believe the marriage of Charity Valdez to Jojo Velasco was genuine. Photo / Jason Oxenham
Velasco said getting residency for Valdez was a big relief and they could finally focus on being a family.
He said the 30-month fight to get the visa had left them in debt.
“We’re so happy finally that we have come out of the tunnel with a bright light, and we can now start planning for the future not only for Charity but for us as a family,” Velasco said.
“Our dream is to have our own house in the near future.”
Their immigration lawyer Maricel Weischede said: “It’s a relief that rational judgment prevailed when Immigration New Zealand assessed the application holistically.”
Weischede said Immigration NZ had given the couple the opportunity to show the validity of their relationship.
“I hope that future applications will be dealt with such compassionate and just decision-making,” she said.
