UK Supreme Court upholds LGBT Asylum seekers

UK Supreme Court upholds LGBT Asylum seekers must not be sent back to countries with risk to their lives.

The Justice for Gay Africans [JfGA] Society heartily welcomes the ruling by the Supreme Court that gay men and women should not be sent ‘back to live discretely’ in countries with homophobic laws.

This ruling is a landmark and goes a long way to ensure that LGBTI people have a fair hearing when seeking safety in the UK from perceived or known persecution in their home country. As the Home Secretary has welcomed this ruling, implementation should be immediate and loopholes checked against as recent researches, like the 'No Going Back' by the Stonewall highlighted a high level of ignorance, disbelief & sheer hatred by immigration staff who handle these cases.

From many indications, it is disheartening to see and know that many ordinary individuals do not know nor understand this grave wickedness carried out by their government through an immigration system riddled with staff who show no humane compassion towards vulnerable people who run here for safety from persecution and forceful lifestyle.

“This is great news. It is consoling to know that someone really cares and recognises the dangers of asking people to ‘go back [to homophobic countries] and live discretely’ hence living a lie for the rest of their lives. The discretion test case confirms that majority of people of this country [UK] are compassionate and understands that ‘living discretely’ contravenes the idea of freedom by all ramifications. We now hope that the government will implement this recommendation sincerely and that other countries bound by the 1951 Convention will follow this excellent judgement”, says Godwyns Onwuchekwa of JfGA.

We have a strong belief in the coalition government to make good this opportunity to improve the image of the UK as a country with respect and support for human dignity and liberty.



NOTE FOR EDITORS (Please circulate amongst your contacts)

Justice for Gay Africans Society (JfGA) is a pressure group based in London and founded by LGBT people of Black and African origin. Our mission is to use civil approaches to bring a change of attitude in black and African people in UK, Africa and other black countries where homosexuality is criminalised and homophobia is rife. We also aim to keep the insecure and inhuman state of treatment of LGBT people in these countries on the top of agenda of the international communities.

For more information, please visit www.jfga.org.uk or email info@jfga.org.uk



Godwyns Onwuchekwa