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News
Kenya in fresh bid to deport Faisal

By NATION Team Posted Wednesday, January 13 2010 at 21:17

Jamaican preacher Sheikh Abdullah al-Faisal was on Wednesday moved
from his remand cell to the airport as the government made a second
attempt to deport him.

The radical Islamic preacher was removed from the Industrial Area
Remand Prison on Tuesday evening, Ms Pauline Ngari, the officer
in-charge, said. He had been held at the jail since Sunday. He is now
being held at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi
pending deportation.

The move came as the Gambia, the destination of his last aborted
expulsion bid, denied ever agreeing to accept him. The Gambian
government has threatened to impound any aircraft that will fly the
preacher to the West African nation.

And in a related development, an activist has gone to court to try and
force the government to produce Sheikh al-Faisal in court. Also sought
by Mr Al-Amin Kimathi in suit papers filed in court on Wednesday, is
an order stopping the government from deporting the cleric before the
application is heard and determined.

The preacher’s presence in Kenya has been declared a security risk by
Immigration minister Otieno Kajwang’. The statement by the Gambian
government complicates matters for the already embarrassed Kenyan
authorities. On Thursday last week, Mr Kajwang’ told the press that
the West African state had accepted Sheikh al-Faisal.

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday in the capital Banjul, acting
director-general of immigration in the Gambia Buba Sagnia, denied
there was any such deal with Kenya. “It’s a lie that Abdullah
al-Faisal was accepted by the Gambian government,” Sagnia told
reporters.

And on Monday, Mr Kajwang’ said that the Gambia and Nigeria had
changed their minds over the controversial cleric. The minister blamed
the media for sending out alarmist reports that portrayed the
religious leader in an “alarmist and negative” way.

“He chose to go to the Gambia, but when he reached Nigeria on his way
to Banjul, the authorities denied him a transit visa and put him on
the next flight back,” Mr Kajwang’ had said on Monday. Attempts to
reach Mr Kajwang’ for comment were not successful as his phone went
unanswered. Kenya does not have direct flights to Jamaica and has to
rely on other countries for passage.

Under international law, too, Kenya has the burden of delivering him
back home safely, protecting his human rights against violation and
ensuring that he is not delivered to another government for torture or
to face charges similar to the ones he was convicted for in the UK in
2003.

A British court convicted the cleric for inciting murder and racial
hatred and sentenced him to nine years in prison back then. He was
then deported to Jamaica in 2007, according to the New York Times. In
court on Wednesday, Mr Kimathi said the cleric entered the country
lawfully and has not breached any laws to warrant detention or
deportation. Mr Kimathi sued immigration minister Otieno Kajwang’, the
police commissioner, the commissioner of prisons and the
attorney-general.

The cleric was first arrested by police at Nyali mosque in Mombasa on
December 31 and never allowed to see friends, said Mr Kimathi. The
decision to hold the cleric in custody for long, he says, contradicts
rights provided for under the constitution and international human
rights convention. The court papers also say that Sheikh al-Faisal was
declared a prohibited immigrant without having been accorded the
opportunity to be heard.

Sheikh al-Faisal says he was never presented before the immigrations
department to answer any questions or even show cause why his
immigration status as granted to him at the Lunga-Lunga border point
should not be revoked. Mr Kimathi argues that the continued detention
of the cleric without preferring any charges amounts to psychological
torture. He also accused the government of holding the man without the
orders of any court of law.

According to the cleric’s wife, Ms Zubeida Khan, who resides in the
UK, her husband was given a two-month visitor’s entry visa into Kenya.
Sheikh al- Faisal arrived in Kenya on December 24 after travelling
through Nigeria, Angola, Mozambique, Swaziland, Malawi and Tanzania.

Reported by Walter Menya, Jillo Kadida and Fred Mukinda

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