A 74-YEAR-OLD grandmother living in Ireland with her daughter and six grandchildren since 2006 has lost a High Court challenge to an order for her deportation. The decision means she cannot validly visit Ireland in the future.
Ms Justice Maureen Clark said, while she had sympathy for the grandmother, Mrs O, from Nigeria, she had chosen to pursue the route of asylum seeker rather than visiting her family here legally on a visitor’s visa.
While the opportunity for Mrs O to travel extensively to visit her grandchildren “may have been limited by her age”, the door was closed to valid visits to Ireland following her deportation. There was nothing to suggest the daughter and grandchildren could not visit her in Nigeria, the judge said.
Unfortunately, this was “not a court of compassion” and she had no discretion, the judge added.
She was giving judgment refusing an application by Mrs O, her daughter and six grandchildren for leave to challenge a decision of the Minister for Justice in February last ordering the deportation of Mrs O.
The core argument was that the Minister had erred in his consideration of their rights to respect for “family life” within the meaning of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
In her unsuccessful asylum application, Mrs O claimed she was a widow of the member of a Nigerian royal family. She sold her home to fund her journey here, she alleged. Her application was rejected on grounds of “serious credibility issues”.
Ms Justice Clark rejected claims the Minister erred in finding no “family life” existed within the meaning of Article 8. The Minister had not misapplied Article 8 in finding nothing more than “normal emotional ties” here and had also not ignored the dependency of the family on the grandmother and her dependency on them, she ruled.
