The Immigration Division is seeking Cabinet’s approval to spend $2.5 million to charter a private jet to deport an illegal immigrant from Ghana who has failed in his bid to stay in T&T while seeking permanent residency through his wife and three-year-old son. The department is being forced to fork out the sum as Musah Ibrahim has repeatedly refused to sign visa applications required for proposed commercial flights. According to an affidavits filed by acting chief immigration officer Gerry Downes to support his application to vary a September 30 deportation deadline set by a High Court judge, the only chartered flight the department has found will be available at the end of the month. “Chartering flights is not a routine thing. It has only been done once in the past, in 2009, so apart from getting the money, I had to revise what special arrangements needed to be made and then put them into effect,” Downes said.
During a hearing in the Port-of-Spain High Court yesterday, Justice Vasheist Kokaram accepted complications raised by the department and changed the deadline to November 6.
There are no direct commercial flights to Ghana but Downes explained that indirect routes with connecting flights through Brazil and South Africa were available at a fraction of the cost. “That requires three plane tickets, because the carriers will not accept a deportee unless he is accompanied by at least two escorts, and the cost of that is a little over $150,000,” Downes said. To make optimum use of the hefty sum, which represents more than a half of the department’s budget allocation for approximately 100 deportations a year, it is trying to expedite deportation lawsuits filed by immigrants from several other West African states, including Ghana and Nigeria, who will possibly accompany Ibrahim on the flight.
In opposing bail for Ibrahim to return to his family pending his deportation, Downes referred to his constant refusal to comply with the department’s requests to sign the necessary travel documents and the fact his wife, Ashley, is encouraging his ongoing action. “If he is put on such an order, all he will need to do to avoid being deported is fail to report for the flight and avoid arrest until it is gone which I believe will not just be likely, but inevitable, given his attitude and past conduct,” Downes said. Kokaram agreed and refused the request. Ibrahim was represented by Farid Scoon and Richard Isaac, while Rajiv Chaitoo represented the Immigration Department.
Background
Ibrahim, from Accra, Ghana, has admitted to entering Trinidad illegally in May 2009. According to an affidavit from his wife, Ashley, with whom he lived with at Second Street, Barataria, before his arrest, Ibrahim wrote to the Ministry of National Security in March last year, seeking permission to leave the country and re-enter officially to begin his residency application. His wife said after consulting a member of staff at the Immigration Department’s Port-of-Spain office, her husband decided to go ahead. On April 2, last year, Ibrahim was arrested at Pier One, Chaguaramas, while boarding a boat bound for Venezuela with his son, Jamal. He was charged with entering the country through an illegal port of entry and was taken to the Port-of-Spain Magistrates Court.
After pleading guilty, Ibrahim was ordered to be deported and was handed a $5,000 fine which his wife paid.
Ashley claimed since being sentenced, her husband has been “inflicted with the most cruel and inhumane form of punishment” at the Immigration Detention Centre, Aripo, which culminated in a recent incident with guards that reportedly left him with a cracked skull. He has been isolated from other detainees after he suffered head injuries in the alleged altercation with staff on July 22.
The incident reportedly prompted Ashley, whom he married in 2010, to file a writ of habeas corpus before Kokaram and to seek to convince the judge to reverse the deportation order against him.
While Kokaram ruled in favour of the Immigration Department, he ruled it was obligated to deport Ibrahim within a reasonable period. As part of his ruling on August 2, Kokaram granted Ibrahim a conditional release if the department was unable to deport him by September 30.