The UK Home Office is set to deport a Nigerian Lesbian, Aderonke Apata seeking asylum in the UK. According to the UK Home Secretary, Theresa May through her barrister, Andrew Bird during a case to decide her stay in the UK, the government argued that she is not a lesbian because she has a daughter. According to the Mr Bird ‘one can’t be a heterosexual one day and a homosexual another’.
The Nigerian, Aderonke Apata who was ‘reported to police for living with her girlfriend in Nigeria, was imprisoned for being a lesbian’. According to the LBGT petitioners, ‘some of her family members and her ex-girlfriend were killed in recrimination’. This they say caused her ‘to flee to the UK, where she has applied twice for asylum’.
The LBGT group in the UK which has started a petition against her deportation, they claim that there is a ‘risk to her life if she returns’ to Nigeria.
Furthermore, the fact remains that due to Nigerian authorities being aware that she is a lesbian, her safety is at risk. She needs to be given refugee status in the UK so that she can stay safe, stay with her fiancée, and continue fighting for human rights.
The court is currently considering the evidence given at her hearing. They have promised to make a decision by the end of this month.
