Somali Man Fights Deportation
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Wellington, NZ, Oct 12, 2005 (One News) – A Somali man is begging the immigration minister not to send him home.
The government wants to send the 26-year-old overstayer back to war-torn Somalia. But the United Nations says the African nation is not safe for failed asylum seekers.
After four days on the run, Abdikarin Ali Haji handed himself in to authorities but he was pleading to stay in New Zealand. He says a return to Somalia would mean death.
"If they want to take me back, I will die," Haji says.
The high court prevented the government sending Haji back to Somalia last year and he was granted a work permit.
But caretaker Immigration Minister Damien O'Connor says Haji should have thought of the situation in Somalia before he broke the law.
One News understands Haji has convictions for traffic offences, possession of a knife and theft.
"Two hundred years ago the English government used to send those who stole a loaf of bread to Australia, it's a bit like that, you have to weigh up the punishment against the crime," says Neville Kay from the New Zealand Refugee Council. Haji says he has appreciated the last seven years that he has been in New Zealand, but is unhappy with "what the government is doing to me".
The United Nations recommends against returning Somalis home who have been declined refugee status because their country has been deemed unsafe. The ombudsman has halted Haji's deportation while an investigation is carried out.
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