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Harassment and
inequality for asylum seekers at UK detention centres
Asylum seeking turns into a nightmare at the detention
centre, if one would not even speak English then you are bound to face all
the abuse and mistreatment inside the detention here in London.
I’m 28 years old and flee from my country because of
my sexual orientation, its pretty sad that I’m not able to go back to my
country but there is nothing much I can do about that, when I arrived in
the uk I knew I faced persecution if I returned to my country and I
started to present my case out here in the UK.
I must say I did get the lawyers that represented me all
the way, but going through all this was not easy for me because I faced
mistreatment while I was detained and discrimination too, He was seeing
someone when I was here but it was not that serious at that time and I
never wanted it to be not until I went through all this on my own without
involving my b/f here.
The first time I was sent to the home office in Croydon
to take the letter from my lawyers I was detained, it was not that
shocking to me because my lawyer had explained to me that it was possible
that I could be detained while going through the case, yes I was detained,
I was taken to two different detention centres, Oakington and
Hammondsworth. Oakington was just as bad as a prison, we were a lot out
there, Jamaicans known to be stubborn, Africans very quiet, eastern
Europeans and Asians.
When I got to Oakington I was searched, photographs
taken, and later taken to where I was to sleep in each dome was about 12
to 16 people nothing much to do out there except to go for free lesson of
English and waiting for court sessions and interviews. I was only there for two day, on
my second day I was told that I would be transferred to another place by
my lawyer, I arrived at oakington on Wednesday and on Saturday I was being
transferred, the whole confusion was when they got mixed up who was
supposed to be put on the plane, we were the three of us.
I was told that I was the one flying and flying to
Ghana, when we were at the Gatwick airport they started arguing among them
selves so they had to call back to find out who really was flying to
Ghana, then they realized that I was the one going to Hammondsworth. When
I got to Hammondsworth I was again searched and photos taken was told that
I will be given 84 pence a day and I would have a visitor if wanted, now
from the look of things this sounded to be much better than oakington, but
as time and days went by, it was a nightmare, it was not just the Jamaicans
that were being homophobic, no it was among the officers too.
Each day of my stay there I was writing, yes this place
had great facilities, I know some British citizens would be saying why
would we need such facilities when we are foreigners here, well I would
say that they should look at how much these foreigner contribute to the
country. The thing is that if you are gay and you can't speak English and
detained, then you would not have any right to even say yes you are gay, I
could not have a peaceful time because all these officers knew that I was gay
and yes they looked at my file and they did not always mock me direct no,
I had inside guys that always chatted with officers that mocked me.
When my b/f started coming to visit me, I was relived
but little did I know that I was bringing trouble upon myself, because
inside the detention centre it was all over on the walls that
discrimination for whatever would not be tolerated, but shockingly I was
being discriminated against, but I knew that, it would not last for long
because hope of staying in the country had gone, then one officer went on
telling another officer that they would do anything, it did not matter to
them because the detainees would soon be deported anyway, that's when I
asked my b/f to stop coming over because I knew
that I was being watched regarding who came to visit me.
At one point my b/f brought me gay magazines and some
officers made it a big issue by saying it was not allowed to have such
magazines in there, when we received things we would go out there in
groups to go and collect but surprisingly they made sure that all the
other guys that went to pick up their things knew that I was gay and
someone had brought me gay magazines as they called it porn
material, all this now came out on the surface
that other detainees were pointing at me and passing comments that I was
homosexual which can be dangerous in detention.
The first room mate I was asked to share the room with
openly asked me if I was gay and I said no I was not and then he said you
be careful here, I also just wanted to make sure that you don’t pounce
on me in the night, I ended up leaving that room and was given a separate
room not just that I could not share but word went around fast that I was
gay and all because of the officers that looked at my file. I must say yes
I was scared because you don’t know what to expect especially when one
officer told me that if the other guys see you with such magazines you
will be in trouble, to honest when I walked in there I was not going to
advertised on behalf of boyz magazine by reading it or flaunt my sexuality
besides I had my own room, but I realized that it the homophobic officers
that could not accept seeing a black African gay guy that spoke English
fluently and being able to stand for his own rights.
My mocking was really getting tense everyday of my stay
in that detention, at the dinning hall it was a talk about me and some
guys would pass comments meaning me being filthy but I would ignore the
same as the officers too. I then stopped having my meals I stayed without
eating for a week not that I had to boycott no, it was discrimination that
had grown and I was even more scared of that than being deported. I had
doctors and other officers come to my room to ask why I was not eating
anymore and I just said it did not feel like.
Usually what happened at harmmondsworth during the visitation we had all
these straight couples that would be holding hands and kissing, to me that
was not my aim, but I felt I had the right to hold my b/f’s hand, not in
a way that would cause disturbance, I knew other families came with their
children so I would not even have thought of going beyond holding my b/f's
hands.
One officer just came up and asked me not to hold hands, I
said why? Then he said it was not allowed, I really freaked out because he
was just being homophobic, I ignored that and continued to hold hands and
he furiously came at me and said my b/f visitation would be terminated,
now this officer was the only one that seemed to have had a problem the
others on the duty were fine with it, my main point is that I surfed
discrimination and why should it be like that if this county is full of
diversity?
I do realize that there are a lot of different people in
this country and who will take it in a different way of looking at gender,
disabilities and other issues that need to be patient with, but what I don’t
understand up to now is that why do we have such people working for places
like Harmondsworth? Is it because they are good and strict at ill-treating
detainees? I have never gone back to harmondsworth to pursue this issue,
but before I was granted stay in the country I reported all these cases
to someone that looks at such issues, but who knows what they do, is it
that its an embarrassment for the country that talks about such diversity
and yet it can't control people like that?
This is not just for me alone, I know these issues
happen all the time and there must be a lot that have faced situations
like me but would not easily express themselves or others have ended up
being deported after all, so what right would they have to bring up the
issues. We all know that discrimination is happening there but how long
will issues like these go on?
Interview by ndanji chola
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