Most of Nigerian asylum requests denied

Only two Nigerian asylum-seekers have been granted refugee status since the start of 1998, according to statistics released by the Department of Justice.

The figures, which the Department says were issued in response to media requests, show that the two successful Nigerian applicants in the period date from 1998. They were initially refused refugee status, along with all 1,311 other Nigerian applications processed that year, but succeeded on appeal. None of the 319 applications dealt with in 1999 was successful, although many of the 200 appeals are still being processed. No Nigerians have been granted refugee status so far this year, with 66 cases processed up to May 16th.

The figures also show that the numbers of Nigerians applying for asylum here has grown from one, or 0.2 per cent of the total, in 1995, to 1,294, or 30 per cent of the total this year to date. But the proportion is down on 1998, when 1,729 applications, or 37 per cent of the total, were Nigerians.

A spokesman said the Minister for Justice would travel to Lagos "within weeks" for discussions with the Nigerian government about measures to reduce the numbers of the country's nationals applying for asylum here.

In terms of simple numbers, the most successful year for Nigerian applications was 1997, when a total of 19 applicants were granted refugee status. There were 665 Nigerian applicants that year, of which eight succeeded at the first stage and a further 11 on appeal.

Anne Lucey adds: The residents of Ballymullen, Co Kerry, where 50 mobile homes with up to 200 asylum-seekers were due to be located in the local army barracks, were last night offered a compromise deal similar to that struck with residents' representatives at Clogheen in Tipperary.

The Directorate of Asylum-Seeker Services has proposed reducing the numbers of mobile homes at the barracks to about 20, and has also offered to set up a new liaison committee to deal with asylum-seekers in Ballymullen.