Home Office set to deport transplant patient to Nigeria

Roseline Akhalu’s doctors warn she will die within weeks

Doctors, clergy and parliamentarians have called upon home secretary Theresa May to stop the removal of kidney-transplant patient Roseline Akhalu to Nigeria.  Roseline, aged forty-nine, who lives in Headingley, Leeds, came to the UK in September 2004 on a student visa, having beaten fierce competition to win a Ford Foundation Scholarship. She fell dangerously ill in April 2005, was put on dialysis, and given a transplant in July 2009.

The immigration authorities want to return Roseline to Nigeria, branding her a ‘health tourist’ even though she applied for her scholarship back in 2002 and her renal specialist James Tattersall, of St James’s University Hospital Leeds, testifies that her illness three years later was sudden and impossible to predict.

He says Roseline’s forcible return to Nigeria could result in her death within weeks because she cannot afford the drugs and monitoring vital to her survival.

John Packer, bishop of Ripon and Leeds; Greg Mulholland, the Liberal Democrat MP for Leeds North West; the All Party Parliamentary Kidney Group; the National Kidney Federation and actor Colin Firth are among those urging the home secretary to grant Roseline indefinite leave to remain in the UK.

Tessa Gregory, of Public Interest Lawyers, has lodged an appeal to be heard on 21 November.

Adrian Rose, Friend in residence at Cumbria’s Glenthorne Quaker Centre where Roseline was a guest last year, says: ‘Rose made a lasting impression on me as a warm, generous spirited and sincere person. I was dismayed to hear of her plight – the suffering caused by her illness, and fear of death if she is deported. I am shocked by the cruel and absurd decision of the Home Office on Rose’s case. I hope and pray that the many voices of support for Rose will help to change the decision, so that good sense and compassion will prevail.’

Adrian has urged Friends in Britain to write to the Home Office on Roseline’s behalf. He said, ‘There is also a petition online – bit.ly/SU5gR2 – which I hope Quakers will support.’

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