The High Court quashed a Refugee Appeals Tribunal decision refusing refugee status to a Nigerian applicant, finding that a key inference used to reject her account was unsupported and had affected the tribunal’s assessment of her alleged captivity.
Mr Justice O’Regan ruled on 5 April 2017 that the tribunal had wrongly inferred that the applicant was rendered unconscious by touching a 10 lira note. The judgment said her statements were that, after taking the note while selling water, she did not know what happened next. In her affidavit and asylum interview, she also said she had been pushed into a van.
The judge said a blow to the head or the trauma of the incident were among other possible explanations for her inability to remember. The account did not imply that touching the note rendered her unconscious. The tribunal’s inference was “at variance with reason and common sense” or, alternatively, was a credibility finding tainted by conjecture or speculation, he said.
The tribunal had relied on that inference when rejecting the applicant’s account of being held captive for almost three weeks. The judge found that the error therefore affected a substantial part of the credibility assessment and could not be treated as separate from the other reasons for refusal.
The applicant had challenged the tribunal’s decision in judicial review proceedings. She said the disputed findings went to the core of her account of past persecution and that the decision should be quashed if those findings were irrational or inaccurate. The respondents argued that the findings should stand, or that any error could be separated from the rest of the tribunal’s decision.
The judgment recorded other credibility concerns accepted by the applicant’s counsel, including an inaccurate initial denial that she had held a passport, despite having previously obtained a UK visa. The tribunal had also questioned aspects of her account of her escape, assistance from others, police reporting and travel to Ireland.
The applicant arrived in Ireland on 21 November 2013 and sought asylum that day. Her application had been rejected initially in March 2014. The tribunal refused refugee status in a decision made around 17 December 2015 and notified on 15 January 2016.
The High Court held that it could not presume what the tribunal would have decided without the flawed inference. It quashed the refusal. The judgment did not grant refugee status or determine the underlying asylum claim.