Nigerian claims breach of right to fair hearing

A Nigerian woman has filed a constitutional application in the First Hall of the Civil Court claiming that her fundamental human right to a fair hearing was violated by the Refugees Appeals Board.

Juliet Ebele Okana (known as Okonkwo) filed her application against the Minister for the Interior and Justice, the Attorney General and the Refugees Appeals Board.

She claimed that she had lived in Malta since 2003 and that she had applied for refugee status in January 2004.

Her application was based upon the fact that her former husband, a Nigerian from whom she was divorced, was threatening both her in Malta and her family in Nigeria.

The Refugees Commission had dismissed Ms Okana's application for refugee status and she had appealed from this decision to the Refugees Appeals Board. While she was waiting for her appeal to be heard, Ms Okana heard that her family in Nigeria were being threatened by her former husband's family.

This threat, she said, was very serious, and her mother and her mother's driver had been shot at. Ms Okana claimed that her mother had been injured while the driver had been killed.

A sworn statement of this incident had also been submitted to the Appeals Board.

Ms Okana claimed that her lawyer had repeatedly requested to be informed of the time when the Appeals Board was going to hear the case and that her lawyer had remitted to the Appeals Board a copy of her divorce decree.

However, neither Ms Okana nor her lawyer were informed of the date of the hearing of her appeal.

In March, Ms Okana was informed that her appeal had been dismissed but she never received a copy of the judgment delivered against her, even though she had requested it.

The Appeals Board decision, submitted Ms Okana, was in violation of her right to a fair hearing for she had been deprived of an opportunity to appear before the board and defend her case.

The board had also violated her rights by failing to give her the reasons for dismissing her appeal and by failing to give her a copy of the judgment.

Ms Okana claimed that if she was sent back to Nigeria she would be subjected to real and serious threats. She therefore requested the court to declare that her rights had been violated.