The High Court has refused a minor’s application for judicial review of a recommendation rejecting his asylum claim, declining to quash the recommendation or order a fresh interview.
In a judgment delivered on 17 October 2007, Mr Justice Paul Butler said the applicant had not established substantial grounds to argue that applying the O’Keeffe principles breached his Convention rights. The court refused the application.
The anonymised applicant, K.S., was born in February 2005 to Nigerian parents. The judgment says he was not an Irish citizen and was entitled only to Nigerian citizenship. His mother, identified as B.S. and acting as his next friend, had herself sought asylum and was unsuccessful. She was served with a deportation order in September 2005.
K.S. applied for asylum in his own right in November 2005, when he was nine months old. His mother completed the questionnaire and answered the questions at his interview. The Refugee Applications Commissioner recommended rejecting the claim, concluding that K.S. had not established a well-founded fear of persecution in Nigeria. He was informed of the unsuccessful application by letter in January 2006.
The challenge focused in part on the Commissioner’s consideration of material drawn from the mother’s asylum application. The judgment records the applicant’s argument that those matters should have been put to her. However, the judge said it was the mother who had established the link between the two applications in her answers to the interviewer.
The judgment also addresses criticism that relocation to another Nigerian state had been mentioned. The judge was satisfied that relocation did not form part of the consideration in this case, which was based on whether there was a well-founded fear of persecution.
The applicant argued that an “anxious scrutiny” standard of review should apply. The court rejected the challenge and refused the application. The judgment does not order a fresh interview or grant the requested relief.