‘Final stage’ hearing for ‘tortured’ mother Peace Musabi
Immigration tribunal to decide on children’s visas
Published: 13 August, 2010
by RÓISÍN GADELRAB
A MOTHER faces an agonising wait to hear if she will be reunited with her children after they were separated as she fled torture and rape in Burundi.
Immigration tribunal judges are deciding if Peace Musabi, who now lives off Hornsey Road, Holloway, will be allowed to bring her three children to live with her.
At a hearing in Hatton Cross, Ms Musabi relived the harrowing experience of sending her children away to safety in 2003 after she and her family, who are Hutu, were targeted by Tutsi authorities.
She claims her husband and eldest son disappeared and her brother was murdered in front of her. She said she sent her surviving children to safety before she was captured, imprisoned, raped and tortured.
But when she managed to escape, Ms Musabi struggled to find her children and fled alone. Her children thought she was dead. She spent the next five years living in the UK and finally tracked them down in Uganda in 2008.
Since then, Ms Musabi has fought for her children to join her. But as she was never granted full asylum, she has no right to bring them here. Their visa application has been twice refused.
Ms Musabi, who now has a UK-born daughter, said: “My heart is full of appreciation for all of the support I have received. It has kept us all going during our hardest times. This hearing is the final stage and I cannot bear to think that we may lose.”
Her eldest son Samuel appealed to the court in a letter, saying: “Please allow us to live with our mother and little sister, who we have never seen. We have missed so many years together and this has affected us so much. My brother and sister, who are 13 and 16, are distraught. I have tried to care for them but we all suffer without our mother’s love. I get nightmares and wake up crying and shivering. To live without our mother after so many agonising years thinking she is dead is the worst cruelty. We need to start rebuilding our torn-apart family.”
Hillrise councillor Greg Foxsmith, a lawyer, is supporting her case. He said: “Peace’s heart-rending story is made all the sadder by her separation from her children, and I strongly believe that it is in the interests of justice that her family are reunited here. I will ensure that the needs of the family are properly supported by this local authority for as long as they reside here.”
The court was bombarded with supportive letters and cards, many made by schoolchildren, who had heard Ms Musabi speak during Refugee Week.
Ann Neal, from Women Against Rape, in Kentish Town, who have been helping Ms Musabi, said: “[Peace] is a traumatised mother whose anguish, and that of her children, is unbearable. Her children’s joy at finding out their mother was alive has turned to incomprehension and shock that for two years they’ve been kept apart from her and the young sister they have never seen.
“Such official contempt for children, mothers and family life can only be described as torture. The immigration judge has the chance to right a grave wrong.”
It is argued that Ms Musabi can’t safely return to Burundi or move to Uganda.
Ms Neal added: “As a single woman and a survivor of rape, she would be ostracised and destitute. Her six-year-old daughter has only ever lived here and is settled in school.”
Judges are expected to make a decision within the next week.