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John
Goddard
Toronto, July 18, 2009 – Strain marks the faces of family and friends as
conditions deteriorate for a Toronto woman trapped in Kenya.
"I would like for them to bring my mom back," said 12-year-old Mohamed
Abscir on Wednesday at Lawrence Square mall, where he and his mother
have habitually gone for treats on Saturday mornings.
"Can you imagine what he's going through?" said neighbor and babysitter
Shukri Abdi. "He's worried his mother might never come home."
In Kenya, eight weeks after her passport was confiscated, the woman
remains confined to her hotel with no travel papers and no money to pay
police bribes if she is stopped without them.
"It's too scary for me to go downstairs now," said the woman identifying
herself as Suaad Hagi Mohamud. "I'm broke. I have no visa, no nothing.
If I'm stopped they will take me to the jail."
Her calls to the Canadian High Commission went unreturned again
yesterday, she said.
Ottawa officials refused to answer questions in a case that, from the
outside, looks easy to resolve.
"If this were Somalia or some place else in Africa, we would
understand," said North York Community House worker Maryan Ali, who is
offering what support she can. "But this is unacceptable."
Mohamud, originally from Somalia, is waiting for fingerprint tests to
confirm her identity.
She was returning to Toronto from Kenya eight weeks ago when a customs
agent said she didn't look like her passport photo.
She spent eight days in jail before being released on bail.
"I asked her, 'How's the jail?' " recalled Abdi, tears welling in her
eyes.
"She told me, 'I don't want to talk about it.' "
A working mother caring for five children of her own, Abdi agreed to
look after Mohamed for three weeks and has now had him for more than two
months.
The stranded woman's passport was voided on May 28 by the Canadian High
Commission in Nairobi. She pleaded to have her fingerprints taken, which
finally happened last Thursday, she said.
All that foreign affairs officers in Ottawa have said publicly is that
the woman is not the rightful owner of the passport she was carrying.
But there remain several unanswered questions: Who is the woman, if not
Mohamud? Is she Canadian? Why are they not returning her calls? And how
much longer will it take to get fingerprint results?
Ali said the case has attracted attention in the Somali community, and
vowed to go to Ottawa to speak out on Mohamud's behalf.
Source: Toronto Star, July 16, 2009
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