UK set to resume deportation of failed Zimbabwean asylum seekers

By Lance Guma
26 November 2007

The Immigration and Asylum Tribunal (AIT) in the United Kingdom has effectively cleared the way for the UK Home Office to begin deporting thousands of failed Zimbabwean asylum seekers. In 2005 a temporary ban on deportations to Zimbabwe was put in place pending the determination of the AIT tribunal on whether deportees faced automatic risk once back home. The case has been dominated by appeals and counter appeals and has been changed from the original AA test case to HS, after a new applicant was chosen to deal with the changing situation in Zimbabwe.

The new ruling which was made public on the AIT website last week becomes the basis for new country guidance criteria on Zimbabwe and will be used to deal with thousands of asylum appeals that relied on the initial 2005 ruling. The UK Home Office has argued it will offer protection to those who genuinely can prove they need it, but will not offer blanket immunity for everyone. This means they will now proceed on a case by case basis. Campaigners however say returnees, irrespective of background, are classed as agents of regime change and face possible arrest, torture and other forms of ill treatment.
The AIT ruling says, ‘the suggestion that the Zimbabwean authorities proceed on the basis that anyone with a connection with Britain must be considered a supporter of the MDC is impossible to reconcile with the significant effort put into obtaining intelligence concerning those in the United Kingdom who do support the opposition. After all, there would be little point in sending CIO operatives to infiltrate groups in the United Kingdom if everyone retuned was, in any event, to be presumed to be a supporter of the MDC and an enemy of the state qualifying for detention and interrogation,’ the judgment argued.
The Refugee Legal Centre immediately issued a statement saying the decision puts thousands of Zimbabweans at risk of deportation and would leave many destitute. The statement says, ‘Most asylum seekers who have been refused asylum receive no financial help from the Government 21 days after losing their appeals. They are then evicted from their accommodation and are not allowed to work. Given the very real risk of human rights abuses in Zimbabwe it is unsurprising that many have chosen destitution.’ The Centre is considering whether it should appeal the latest decision. They argue that the situation in Zimbabwe, ‘is highly dangerous and is only likely to get worse in the run up to the Presidential and Parliamentary elections next March.’