Resh­ma Ra­goonath

A San Fer­nan­do mag­is­trate yes­ter­day ex­pressed con­cern that food badges were be­ing is­sued to for­eign­ers who do not hold work per­mits.Fourth Court Mag­is­trate Tara­mat­tie Ram­dass ques­tioned the le­gal­i­ty of the pro­ce­dure when four Chi­nese na­tion­als ap­peared be­fore her on work per­mit re­lat­ed of­fences. Po­lice pros­e­cu­tor Sgt Dwight Halls said an in­ves­ti­ga­tion has been launched in­to how busi­ness­man Fawen Zheng, his wife Xi­aomei Cen, broth­er Young Hao and sis­ter Qix­ing ob­tained food badges.Ram­dass said she was "con­fused" about the mat­ter since it is a le­gal re­quire­ment that a for­eign na­tion­al must have a work per­mit in or­der to be is­sued a food badge.

Zheng, own­er of Tai Yuan Chi­nese Restau­rant at Na­pari­ma Ma­yaro Road, Co­coyea, was charged on Au­gust 3 with em­ploy­ing his wife, broth­er and sis­ter, nei­ther of whom held a valid work per­mit. Cen, Young Hao and Qix­ing were all charged with work­ing with­out one. They all car­ried food badges.Ram­dass said the fam­i­ly might have a strong claim against the State as the is­suance of a food badge is tan­ta­mount to an ap­proval to ply a trade lo­cal­ly.

"How were they is­sued this? It's like telling them go ahead and ply their trade, then they are ar­rest­ed," she not­ed.Zheng, his wife and sis­ter, through an in­ter­preter, plead­ed guilty to the charges. Young Hao plead­ed not guilty.The busi­ness­man was fined $1,500 with the al­ter­na­tive of 45 days' sim­ple im­pris­on­ment in de­fault, while Cen and Qix­ing were fined $1,000 each or 30 days' sim­ple im­pris­on­ment. They were or­dered to pay the fines im­me­di­ate­ly.

Young Hao was grant­ed bail in the sum of $20,000 with a sure­ty and will re­turn to court this morn­ing.Zheng said he ap­plied for per­ma­nent res­i­dence and had his in­ter­view. He said he ap­plied for work per­mits for his rel­a­tives but those ap­pli­ca­tions are still pend­ing.Halls told the court that a par­ty of po­lice and im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers went to the restau­rant to in­ves­ti­gate a re­port that for­eign na­tion­als were em­ployed there. They found Cen, a chef, and Qix­ing, the cashier, on the job. Young Hao was ar­rest­ed in the kitchen.When Zheng was ar­rest­ed for em­ploy­ing them he told po­lice he was "fix­ing up" the per­mits. The women de­nied they were be­ing paid.