A Nigerian mother who was deported from Ireland but later illegally returned has lost her High Court challenge to the deportation orders made for her and her children.
Mr Justice John McMenamin said yesterday the woman's credibility was undermined by her "unexplained failure" to bring to the notice of the Irish authorities, prior to making several applications for leave to remain here, her alleged fears that her two daughters would be exposed to the risk of genital mutilation if returned to Nigeria.
He dismissed the challenge by Olwakemi Adedaju Dada and two of her children, aged 10 and 12, to deportation orders made by the Minister for Justice on March 5th, 2004.
Ms Dada arrived here in 1998, and her children came in the following two years.
In her application for refugee status, which was refused in 1999, she claimed she had a fear of persecution if returned to Nigeria and alleged she had been subject to sexual assaults by soldiers there.
At no stage in the course of five separate applications for humanitarian leave to remain was any reference made either to the Minister having, in his letter proposing to deport them, wrongly categorised the applicant's two daughters as failed asylum seekers, the judge said.
Nor was any reference made to the applicant having a fear that her two daughters would be exposed to the risk of genital mutilation if returned to Nigeria.
The unexplained failure of the applicant - a caring mother - to bring her alleged fears to the attention of the authorities fundamentally undermined the credibility of her present alleged fears, the judge said.
He said that, after she was deported, the applicant had remained in Nigeria for about 18 months without seeking permission from the High Court to be readmitted into the State.
This was quite extraordinary given the alleged danger faced by her children.
She not only had not sought injunctions but had also on two separate occasions allowed her judicial review application to be adjourned until the hearing by the Supreme Court of another case.
This inaction on her part for which no explanation was even offered raised the question of credibility in a very stark way, especially as it would have been open to her to instruct her lawyers with whom she continued in contact, the judge said.
He said the applicant and her children had illegally re-entered the State, apparently via Northern Ireland. There had been no full explanation given as to how they travelled from Nigeria to Ireland, nor had there been any recognition on their part as to the extent or status of their actions, which must be seen as unlawful.
The judge adjourned the matter to Friday when submissions in relation to a possible appeal against his decision will be made.