The High Court dismissed judicial review claims by a Ghanaian mother and her minor daughter challenging decisions in their asylum cases. The court held that the Refugee Appeals Tribunal had evidence to support its conclusion that state protection against female genital mutilation (FGM) might be available in Ghana. It also found the daughter’s application had been validly subsumed within her mother’s.
The mother said her family had threatened to force her to undergo FGM and that her Ghanaian-born daughter would face similar demands. She said she had not gone to police because, in her view, the law respected the tradition in her village. Her sister had died after undergoing FGM, she said.
The Refugee Applications Commissioner recommended that the mother not be recognised as a refugee, reasoning that state protection could have been available if she had sought it. The Refugee Appeals Tribunal affirmed that decision in September 2006. It relied in part on country information that FGM was criminalised in Ghana and that prosecutions had occurred, while acknowledging that the practice continued, including in the north.
The applicants argued in judicial review that the tribunal had selectively used country information, failed to assess whether protection was adequate in practice, and failed to give proper weight to the mother’s history. The daughter separately argued that the Commissioner and tribunal had not considered her circumstances as an individual case. The respondents said the mother had expressly included her daughter in her asylum application and had signed the relevant forms.
Justice John Edwards said he had read all the country information and was not satisfied that it had been selectively used or that the tribunal’s conclusion ran against its overall thrust. He criticised the tribunal’s description of Ghana’s progress against FGM as a “huge improvement”, calling it an overstatement, but concluded there was still sufficient evidence of state protection and a generally improving situation to sustain the tribunal’s decision. He said judicial review was not a basis to interfere with that decision where evidence supported it and the tribunal had acted within its jurisdiction.
The judge said the sister’s death did not establish that state protection had been unavailable: there was no evidence that protection had been sought in her case or that her death was recent. He also accepted that the daughter’s application had been validly included in her mother’s. The court dismissed both claims; it did not grant the requested orders to quash the asylum decisions.