The High Court has dismissed a Nigerian woman’s judicial review challenge to the Refugee Appeals Tribunal’s refusal of her asylum application, finding that the tribunal’s conclusions on state protection and internal relocation were reasonably open to it.
The applicant, identified in the judgment as M.O., said she had been raped by her husband’s brother in 2000 and assaulted during an attempted rape in 2003. She also described later threats and said her husband and his family did not support her. She left Nigeria in February 2010, according to the judgment, and applied for asylum after arriving in Ireland.
The Refugee Appeals Tribunal affirmed the recommendation to refuse her application in June 2010. In judicial review proceedings, M.O. argued that the tribunal had made irrational credibility findings, relied selectively on country information about whether Nigerian authorities protect women from domestic violence, and failed to properly assess whether she could relocate within Nigeria.
The court said the law presumes a state can protect its citizens, and that an applicant must provide clear and convincing proof to rebut that presumption. It found the tribunal was entitled to conclude that M.O. had not established an absence of state protection. The judgment noted that she had not reported the alleged abuse to Nigerian police, and that her interview answers included that family matters were dealt with within the family and that police might not help.
The judge also considered the country information cited by M.O. Some material was undated or old, and the court said the tribunal was not required to discuss every document individually. It concluded the tribunal could regard a statement that police did not intervene in domestic disputes as having limited relevance to the specific allegations in this case.
On credibility, the judge accepted that at least some of the tribunal’s findings appeared “somewhat irrational”. However, the court did not find that this tainted the entire decision. It said the state-protection conclusions were separate from credibility considerations.
The judge said it was not essential to decide the internal-relocation issue, but added that the tribunal’s conclusion was reasonably open on the evidence. The tribunal had considered M.O. a mature businesswoman with education and initiative and concluded relocation should be possible.
The court dismissed the judicial review application. It did not grant the requested order quashing the tribunal decision.