UK to deport Zimbabwe asylum seekers

Thousands of failed asylum seekers from Zimbabwe face immediate deportation from the UK after that country’s Immigration and Asylum Chamber (IAC) ruled that their lives were no longer threatened back home.

The IAC handed its judgment on Monday in a new case that ends a five-year moratorium on deportation of failed Zimbabwean asylum seekers.

IAC was reviewing its 2008 findings in a country guidance case known as RN, which found that the country was still not safe for Zimbabweans who were opposed to President Robert Mugabe’s long rule.

Most of the asylum seekers are supporters of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, which formed a unity government with President Mugabe’s Zanu-PF in 2009.

“As a general matter, there is significantly less politically-motivated violence in Zimbabwe, compared with the situation considered by the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal in RN,” reads the new IAC judgment published on Monday.

“In particular, the evidence does not show that as a general matter, the return of a failed asylum seeker from the UK having no significant MDC profile, would result in that person facing a real risk of having to demonstrate loyalty to the Zanu-PF.”

Done with muscle

Last year, the UK sent a mission to Zimbabwe and it concluded that the political environment had since improved.

However, human rights group and even British MPs have criticised the judgment saying the situation in Zimbabwe was deteriorating after police loyal to President Mugabe stepped up the arrest of his opponents.

A senior minister from MDC is in remand prison after he was arrested last week on what Mr Tsvangirai says are trumped up charges.

Five activists are also facing treason charges after they were caught watching a video of the Egypt uprisings that toppled long serving dictator Hosni Mubarak.

Three others are facing similar charges, which carry the death penalty for calling for a separate state in south western parts of the country.

“We need to be conscious that the security situation in Zimbabwe has not improved greatly and those refugees and asylum seekers should therefore not be pressurised to return home prematurely,” Lord Leslie Griffiths, the Baron of Bury Port told the House of Lords on Friday.

“Perhaps, we can put a little bit of muscle behind the coaxing—if it can be done with muscle—of the UK Border Agency and other authorities towards that end.”

An estimated three million Zimbabweans have sought refuge in southern Africa and Western countries over the years after escaping from politically motivated violence and the economic meltdown.

South Africa, which has the biggest number of refugees, says it would resume deportations in August after suspending them in April last year to give a chance to the illegal Zimbabwean immigrants to regularise their stay in the country.