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| National |
| Malawi deports Burundian back to UK |
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by
Willie Zingani, 09 June 2006
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06:13:50
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The Immigration Department in Lilongwe on Thursday deported back to Britain a Burundi national, Rose Ngoingoi, who is alleged to have used a Malawi passport to enter the UK two years ago.
Ngoingoi, 23, told The Nation on Wednesday night that she obtained a Malawi passport during her brief stay in the country in 2004 when a Malawian man gave her shelter after she had fled the civil war in Burundi.
“I used that passport to join my friends in Oxford where I wanted to seek political asylum,” said Ngoingoi, adding that upon arrival she immediately surrendered the passport at the Malawi High Commission in London.
She said the British immigration authorities arrested her over the weekend and immediately deported her to Malawi under tight security escort even after telling them that she was not a Malawian—and only to receive fresh deportation orders upon arrival at the Kamuzu International Airport on Tuesday afternoon.
Home Affairs Minister Bob Khamisa confirmed Ngoingoi’s deportation, saying he did not understand why the British immigration authorities sent her back to Malawi even after she had told them that she obtained the Malawi passport illegally which she surrendered to Malawian authorities in London.
“We had no option but to send her back to UK where the British government will make a decision either to grant her asylum or not,” said Khamisa.
Senior British Private Detainee Custody Officer Roy Stagg, who escorted Ngoingoi to Malawi and kept her under guard at Capital Hotel, on Wednesday night said the deportee would be handed over to immigration authorities at Heathrow Airport for a new course of action.
“I can’t say whether she will be detained or granted asylum in UK,” said Stagg. “My duty is to escort illegal immigrants to their countries of origin.”
Executive Director of the Malawi Watch Billy Banda said his organisation worked with the immigration officials in Lilongwe to ensure that arrangements were finalised to send Ngoingoi back to UK.
“Such cases are common these days, but we think where illegal immigrants from other African countries are found in UK the solution is not to deport them to Malawi, especially when it is established that they entered Malawi and obtained travel documents illegally,” said Banda.
Ngoingoi said she lost both parents in the civil war when she was a baby and fled to Malawi after her aunt could no longer continue looking after her.
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