Examination of Witnesses (Questions 528
- 539)
TUESDAY 28 MARCH 2006
MS SARAH
HARLAND, DR
JOANN
MCGREGOR
AND MR
CRISPEN KULINJI
Q528 Chairman: Thank you very much
indeed for joining us this morning. As you know, we have been
having a series of evidence sessions about the operation of the
Immigration and Nationality Department. It is a particularly valuable
session this morning because we will be talking to people who
have different aspects from different places of experience of
IND and how it operates and the issues that arise. So we are very
grateful to you for your written evidence and for coming this
morning. For the record, could I ask you to introduce yourselves?
Dr McGregor: I
am JoAnn McGregor, a university lecturer at the University of
Reading.
Ms Harland: I am Sarah Harland,
the coordinator for the Zimbabwe Association, which is a support
group for Zimbabweans, asylum seekers and refugees.
Mr Kulinji: I am Crispen Kulinji
and I am a guest of the Home Office. My case is still pending.
Q529 Chairman: Thank you very much
indeed. What I would like to start with is a few background questions.
As we know, about a third of all visa applications from Zimbabweans
were refused in 2004-05—the last year we have figures for—and
half of the student visa applications were refused in the same
year. What is your sense of why so many people from Zimbabwe are
refused entry clearance to the UK? I do not want to ask of you
to answer each question, you will be pleased to know, but who
would like to have a shot at that?
Ms Harland: We feel that many
people are being refused because of the perception that Zimbabweans
coming into the UK are fleeing from political persecution, and
no matter whether they come under a student visa or a holiday
visa there is a high possibility that they might claim asylum
here.
Q530 Chairman: So you feel that there
is a tendency to have a blanket refusal just in case people would
then claim asylum?
Ms Harland: Yes.
Q531 Chairman: I do not know if you
have direct or perhaps indirect experience of the immigration
service in Harare, but in your experience do British Entry Clearance
Officers treat individuals fairly or are there particular problems
with the system there? Have you come across issues of racism or
of corruption or problems with the operations of the ECOs in Harare?
Dr McGregor: There were Press
allegations of corruption in 2004 and they arrested a number of
police officers and army officers who policed the queues outside
the High Commission, who were taking foreign currency bribes to
speed up the process.
Q532 Chairman: Were those employees
of the British Government or of local officials?
Dr McGregor: They would have been
local Zimbabwean employees but serving to police the queues outside
the British High Commission.
Q533 Chairman: In general or otherwise
what is the experience of Africans who try to use the system in
the proper way in Harare?
Ms Harland: Some people feel that
they spend a lot of money trying to get the visa, and it is not
refundable. The fee nowadays for the whole package, when money
is paid to an agent, the fees to the Embassy, et cetera, is something
like 39 million Zimbabwean dollars. Even if you get your visa—someone
recently got a student visa after three months and got to the
UK at Gatwick and was refused entry here anyway because immigration
here felt that there was a similar course available in Zimbabwe
and so he should be taking that. So some people feel that even
if you go through the whole process you might not get in anyway.
Mr Kulinji: I think I would like
to add to that. First and foremost, where the British Embassy
is located is just close to where Mugabe put his offices, so we
are talking about someone who visits the Embassy who is seen at
the British High Commission. That area is concentrated by heavily
armed CIOs and field sergeants. Then the procedures to get a visa
are so complicated. We are looking at a person who is running
away from persecution, and the first thing that person needs to
have is a Zimbabwean passport, of which it takes a year to get
that passport—that is if you get it after paying a lot of
price. Then you come to the British requirements to get that visa:
they need proof of the address of where you are going and proof
of employment or education, and a bank statement which has 100
million in dollars for three months in your account. But you are
looking at a country whereby an average salary is nine million
and doctors earn 12 million. Then we are looking at someone who
faces persecution, who earns roughly five million a month and
he is expected to have a bank statement of 100 million Zimbabwean
dollars in his account for three months, to show that the money
is his. Then from there he needs proof of address to where he
is coming in the United Kingdom. After getting that visa that
person is not guaranteed entry. I do not know if there is a double
standard between the British authorities here and the ones who
work back home in Zimbabwe because if someone is granted a visitor's
visa why then is he denied entry at Gatwick airport? An asylum
seeker does not get a visa to come to this country, but if he
is facing persecution what does he do? Either he gets a foreign
passport, which is easy in Africa, or he seeks a visa as a visitor
to get entry into this country and then claim asylum, which most
Zimbabweans are doing. Then after that the Home Office will come
and say, "Why did you claim asylum at the port?" Yet
they are the same people who are refusing the asylum seeker a
visa while he is still in Zimbabwe. So these are the complications
that a person meets. Let us go to the money that the person has
paid. They are expected to pay 850,000 Zimbabwean dollars; from
there you pay a visa fee to the British Embassy, which is 9 million
Zimbabwean dollars, if my figures are correct; then from there
you are using an agent to get that visa, and you pay a total amount
of 30 million—this is the kind of figure.
Q534 Chairman: By an "agent"
do you mean an adviser? This is a legitimate process, not an illegitimate
process?
Mr Kulinji: Yes. You pay 30 million
Zim dollars, depending on the agent that you are using back home.
Q535 Mr Streeter: Can you give us
a rough conversion rate at this stage?
Mr Kulinji: I think I would need
a calculator because on the black market you are talking that
one pound is equivalent to 355,000—that is black market.
With the bank rate one pound is equivalent to 166. The rate is
always fluctuating because of the inflation in Zimbabwe. After
that the process takes about six weeks to two months, waiting
for a visa for someone who is running away from persecution. From
there, after you have been refused that visa you are now in a
situation whereby you are going to lose 39,850.000 Zim dollars,
a person who has been working for four years, starving his family
to save this money. But my question still stands: will this person
save this money while he is still running away from the most cruel
security agents at home?
Q536 Chairman: Thank you very much.
Indeed, you have set out very well the difficulties that face
people. If I could turn the issue round though and put the dilemma,
as it must appear, perhaps, to the British Government? As Mr Kulinji
said, a number at least of those who are applying for visas are
seeking to flee persecution. You said in answer to my first question
that the IND is refusing visas on the grounds that people might
be fleeing persecution and wanting to seek asylum. There is a
dilemma there, is there not, for the British Government? If the
British Government—and we do not represent the government,
of course—is not minded to issue asylum to Zimbabweans then
it is perhaps understandable that they are refusing visas on the
grounds that people might apply for asylum. Do you take my point?
How should the system be operated differently in Harare so that
legitimate visitors do not face the obstacles that they do? I
mean straightforward rather than legitimate—so that straightforward
visa applicants do not face the problems that they do, but asylum
issues are dealt with properly so that people are not forced into
the visitor route. Is there a way that the government can square
that circle? You see the dilemma? Sarah Harland.
Ms Harland: Yes, I can see the
dilemma from this side, but our perception is that people who
are able to travel freely from Zimbabwe are largely members of
the elite. There are exceptions, there is the academic elite,
but there is also the government elite. Those people have all
the criteria, they have enough money and they can do what they
like. It is the people who are suffering in Zimbabwe, who are
stranded there, who are suffering in this way. We know that the
UK has tried to cut down on asylum figures here and is trying
to contain the situation but the neighbouring countries in southern
Africa have taken a huge burden on the people fleeing from Zimbabwe.
Botswana is a country of roughly 1.8 million in population and
there are probably about 400,000 to 500,000 Zimbabweans who have
gone there; 33% of people in various towns there are Zimbabwean
illegals. The same is true of South Africa; that anything between
two and three million Zimbabweans have gone down there; about
a third of the Zimbabwean population is outside. The number of
Zimbabweans who claimed asylum in the UK in the last five or six
years is round about 16,000, which is nothing compared to what
southern Africa, the neighbouring countries are taking in. Until
there is a stable situation in Zimbabwe people are going to continue
to leave. And Britain has an historic connection; it has huge
links with Zimbabwe. If the Foreign Office is continually condemning
what is going on there but at the same time not being willing
to accept that people are fleeing from persecution and need help
then we have that problem again.
Dr McGregor: Another relevant
fact is that the current system is simply forcing people into
the black market—it is not stopping people from leaving
because there are cheaper, less cumbersome, less politically visible
alternatives than queuing up for a visa officially. So the current
system is simply creating a problem of irregular migration, whereas
if you had a system that appeared more politically neutral, appeared
more transparent and was less costly then you would have people
coming in in a legitimate way rather than forcing them into illegitimate
routes.
Q537 Chairman: The government might
say yes, that is fine, but if in real crude small "p"
politics we made it easier for people to come here and claim asylum
then there would be an unlimited number of people—clearly
400,000 people go to Botswana—so what would your answer
be to the government saying, "The pressure is on us politically
from our voters, from our electorate, and whatever, is simply
to stop this flow of asylum seekers, however it is done"?
Dr McGregor: Some of the main
constraints on leaving Zimbabwe are raising the finance. So if
there was a less cumbersome system where you could apply for a
UK visa you still would not have every Zimbabwean at Gatwick because
people cannot afford the flights, and Crispen was telling you
about the average salaries, even of a doctor, and it simply does
not translate into an air fare.
Chairman: Thank you. Richard Spring.
Q538 Mr Spring: Thank you, Chairman.
I just want to say that there is no Member of Parliament who is
not just totally appalled and horrified at what has happened there.
I visited Zimbabwe myself a few years ago and certainly will not
be going back—or would be very unwelcome if I went back
to it, shall we put it like that. But what I do not quite understand
is that you are painting a picture of extreme difficulty in coming
to this country—and maybe this is a question that Mr Kulinji
might wish to answer—and also, Ms Harland, you mentioned
the fact that there were significant numbers of Zimbabweans in
neighbouring countries, which is perfectly logical, so why would
people want to come here? If they are escaping persecution, which
obviously is true, given the huge difficulties of the cost of
the fares and everything else to come here, why would people want
to come here at all if they are going to be safe—and that
is the key to this, we are not talking about economic migrants
here—in neighbouring countries? It is a question which I
am asked and I would like to know what your feeling about that
is, because we had a comparable situation in Bosnia at one point.
Ms Harland: I will put in a quick
example. Amongst the people in the UK who are asylum seekers we
have an example of someone who fled to Botswana during the Gukurahundi
in the 1980s when there was a massacre of civilians in Matabeleland.
He was a political activist; he was with ZAPU. He fled to Botswana
and the CIO came across the border and brought him back to Zimbabwe
where he spent three years in a Zimbabwean jail before the Unity
Accord in 1987. People do not feel safe if they have been a fairly
high profile political activist. The borders of southern African
countries are very porous; you get CIO people popping up in Zambia,
Botswana, South Africa, all those countries, so if you have been
very active you know that you can be picked off and taken back
to Zimbabwe. There have been cases of women abducted in South
Africa and found on the border in the boot of the car by the South
African police. The people were not arrested who were taking them
back there but the women were released, and that is happening
frequently.
Mr Kulinji: I have something to
add on that. Especially in the southern region in Africa the Mugabe
junior minister is a good example, whereby a delegation led by
the opposition leader was in Zambia. The following morning they
were deported. The Zimbabwean police arrived in Zambia giving
directives to the Zambian government to deport, including the
MDC president. Then we have a situation whereby Zimbabweans are
put in the prisons of Africa. Hence, instead of putting them on
a train because they will jump off and go back they are now putting
them on a plane from South Africa back to Zimbabwe. Another good
example is one of Mugabe's personal aides who tried to escape
and he went to South Africa and the following morning he was back
to Zimbabwe. So the issue of people getting refuge in the neighbouring
countries is a bit difficult. Like in Malawi we have a president
who is married to a Zimbabwean—the president of Malawi has
a family in Zimbabwe—and Mugabe's aides opened the parliament
on Tuesday in Malawi. So the links are so strong that a person,
especially a high profile member, cannot go and seek refuge in
the neighbouring countries.
Chairman: Thank you. Richard Benyon.
Q539 Mr Benyon: My first question
to Sarah Harland might sound rather trivial after what we have
just discussed and before what I want to move back to, which are
the experiences of Crispen Kulinji. But as we are working through
these issues I want to ask you about the ancestral visa matter.
Is that a matter with which you have been involved? A lot of us
as MPs have found people coming to our surgeries who have tried
to use the long-established ancestral visa route for getting into
Britain and have found that they have been held up for 20 months,
sometimes more, because of alleged fraud amongst people trying
to get into this country through that route. Do you have experience
of that and do you know what these allegations of fraud are and
the extent of them?
Ms Harland: We have heard a little
of some fraud that has emanated, I think, in Scotland—there
was a case there. We have had very little to do with ancestral
visas ourselves because the vast majority of people who come to
us are people who are not entitled to ancestral visas anyway.
So we have just heard on the grapevine that there was some production
of false documents, and I am aware that that has been investigated
but I do not know much more about it, I am afraid.
| 
