9.1 Seeking asylum

So, my name is Syeda Akbar and I’m mother of two children. I came to UK in July 2013, facing persecution back home. A fatwa was issued. That’s a religious ruling against me. I was accused for something I never did, and I had a threat that my boys would be taken away because of the Islamic laws, so I came to UK on a visit visa for six months. My sister, she was studying here. She was doing her degree from here, and I got an invitation from her, so the plan of the family was that I’ll just stay away for some time from all this, whatever was happening.

When I stayed here for six months, my grandmother, she was back home and she suggested that it’s still not safe to come back, and I had nowhere to go. I did make some random telephone calls to random solicitors and, all of them, they simply refused and just said they could not help me out, and a couple of them did say but the amount that they demanded was a lot of money, which I could not afford. So, I was blank. I did not know what to do, did not know what the solution was. I was really, really anxious, and worried about the circumstances because the landlord gave me the notice. I could not stay there because I did not have any immigration status and I was worried that I had two children.

It was amazing to see the way they helped me out, and I did ask a couple of times to my advocate that ‘how much are you going to charge me?’ and she just assured me… she said ‘we won’t charge anything, like, just relax, we are just here to help you.’ And I just bursted into tears and I was like ‘I’ve just got two small boys, and it’s me, and this is what has happened. We all will be killed and I don’t know what to do, and please trust me! I’m telling you the truth, honestly I’m telling you the truth’ and she just had an eye-to-eye contact with me and she said ‘listen, Syeda, I know you’re telling the truth but you have to prove that. Have you got an evidence for that?’ and I was like ‘yes, I have got the evidence but I don’t know what to do.’ So, immediately, like, they contacted immigration solicitors, booked an appointment for an asylum case with the Home Office because they were concerned that my visa is going to run out within a couple of days. We did manage to get that appointment, did go to the solicitor with one of the advocates of Southall Black Sisters. So gave my witness statement, she assured me that ‘yes, we’ll go on with the case’ and then the case was in the process, and it was quite uncertain at that time but still a hope. And then, after six months of immigration process, we were just simply chucked out by the landlord. He wasn’t really very kind. First of all, I did not have any money to give him because of all the funds that I brought with me from Pakistan, they exhausted, and secondly, he was more concerned that we were illegal although we were not because our case was pending with the Home Office but somehow he thought like that

I had my bags in my hand and I said ‘this is the story, this is what happened’. So, the lady who came out got all the details and she said ‘I’m not really very sure if I can help you but let me just speak to my manager if we can see how can we sort you out’. She took the details of the children, their school, and said that ‘have you got any friends? Have you got anywhere to go, any relatives?’ and I said ‘no.’ At that time, my sister was gone back to Pakistan, so she wasn’t here, so it was that kind of destitute situation and, sadly, it didn’t work out really very well because we sat there for hours and hours and hours ‘til the officers closed down in just a few minutes before the offices closed down, she came out and she said she has had a word with her managers or seniors, and ‘sorry, we can’t help you or your children out because you haven’t got any immigration status. You are still in the asylum process, so you’re not our responsibility’ and so I was blank at that point, and I was like ‘then, what do you want me to do?’ and she said ‘I’m sorry, I can’t do anything’ and I said ‘well, you have to tell me to do something because I honestly haven’t got any space to go, and what about my children, like we haven’t got any money to buy food, to do anything, and I was really… I burst into tears, and I was like ‘then, please tell me who’s going to help me?’

I honestly did not know that I was entitled for anything. I just went there as a help. My advocate, she suggested me that it’s their responsibility to help you, so somehow that thing was in my mind that ‘well, this is the department of the government, which has to help me because I’ve got children.’ But it didn’t happen, didn’t work out like that. They weren’t concerned about the children. They didn’t say, like, if you wanted anything or if children wanted anything, or ‘we are sorry we can’t help you but we can just contact any of the agencies, which can help you.’ It didn’t work out.

Well, I wanted a compassion towards people without any discrimination or without any judgement. I did get that essence that I was kind of discriminated of not having a secure immigration status, and I understand that the person who was dealing my case or their managers, they did not understand that I had my immigration case pending with the Home Office. Even if you’re an overstayer, you’re still a human being. And what about the children, like, why didn’t they put them in consideration?

Southall Black Sisters really very generously provided us accommodation, then it took them the whole day to search out the process and filled out my NASS accommodation application forms, took advice from the solicitor. I think it was the same day, when we were accommodated to Thornton Heath, which was a temporary accommodation. It’s a hostel where Home Office gives temporary accommodation with the support of NASS, National Asylum Seekers Support, while we wait for our accommodation where will we go. And after three months, me and children, we were dispersed to Coventry in September 2014. If you apply for National Asylum Seekers Support, they can accommodate you anywhere so it’s not Coventry, they could just place you anywhere wherever they have accommodation.

When we went to Coventry, and then we weren’t in the town centre also, so we were in the outskirts of Coventry, so really isolated, lonely area. So, it wasn’t a good experience. Three of us we really struggled to integrate and to rebuild our lives. Boys were alright after some time because they did get their schools sorted out and everything. It was me, I was really locked up in the house, and that really deteriorated my mental health services because I was having my counselling and I was engaged with the support groups meeting people and I didn’t know anybody, so it was just like a strange place

It was really, really difficult but, yes, now by God’s grace, it’s sorted out. Last year, we got, me and the boys, we got our recognised leave to remain as refugees, and after that, six months after getting leave to remain, that was again a very hard process because, then, the NASS accommodation immediately after 28 days takes your housing away. They stopped the money – what they were giving, and everything is stopped, and then you have to go through the system again, and that transition period is so scary because there’s no support, there’s no financial support.

So, there was a joy and there was trauma. So, joy was at least no-one’s throwing us away and we were alive and we weren’t going to get killed. Our boys will not be taken away from me, and I won’t get lashes or all that thing at my back, whatever the fatwa stated, so that was a joyful thing, and it was traumatic again because, again, that NASS accommodation was at least a shelter for three and a half years, and then again you did not know, and you had to prove everything again. The saddest thing was that I had the letters from Home Office. I had the letters they had been given leave to remain. I had a termination of contract letter from NASS board, and I showed it to council but you, again, have to prove everything to them. It’s a very traumatising process. I just don’t understand how the system works. I just don’t understand if this is the law or this is the attitude of the people. I just don’t understand.

Honestly, telling you the truth, I am quite settled now. Things have been really, very unsettled and uncertain in the past. So I’m quite settled in my mind, I can’t say, like, financially or anything like that, I’m still on that process. But struggling to get the job because I had five years of no experience. Kids are happy. They are studying well. They have kind of been integrated into the system. I’m not saying that they’ll forget the past. Both of them had to go through counselling sessions at different stages of their time, and I did understand stress. I collapsed as an adult, so they were children, so they had to go through all this process, both of them, and they did have support from schools but when both children went through the counselling process, whatever trauma all of us as a family unit face.