The High Court has refused a Zimbabwean applicant’s request to quash decisions recommending against international protection and refusing permission to remain in Ireland. Ms Justice Tara Burns delivered the judgment on 12 January 2021 in *MM (Zimbabwe) v Chief International Protection Officer and others* [2021] IEHC 28.
The applicant sought judicial review of an International Protection Officer’s recommendation that she receive neither refugee status nor subsidiary protection, and a later decision refusing her permission to remain. The officer’s recommendation followed a finding that her account lacked credibility. The judgment records that she had claimed she was married as a child, had a relationship with a woman in Zimbabwe, and faced threats after that relationship was discovered. Those claims were rejected at first instance.
The applicant argued, among other grounds, that the law required a designated protection officer to be assigned before her personal interview and to oversee the application through to the final recommendation. The interview took place on 31 January 2019, before an officer was assigned to the file on 28 February. The court held that the International Protection Act 2015 did not require the final recommending officer to be assigned before the interview or to arrange it. It relied on the Act’s provisions allowing other officers or authorised panel members to carry out functions, while reserving the final recommendation to an International Protection Officer.
The applicant also challenged how the interview report was completed. The court found that the interviewer’s later additions addressing the statutory requirements for matters relevant to a permission-to-remain decision were lawful. It said the challenged first-instance recommendation was therefore not invalid on those grounds.
On the separate refusal of permission to remain, the applicant argued that the decision did not give proper reasons for concluding that return to Zimbabwe would not breach Ireland’s non-refoulement obligations. The court distinguished an earlier case involving a review after further submissions. Here, it said, the applicant had made no additional submissions before the decision, which accepted the earlier protection findings and did not revisit the rejected claims.
The applicant further argued that the first-instance decision had failed to determine whether she was a lesbian. The court concluded that, although the decision did not state this expressly, its reasoning showed that the claim had been rejected. The issue could be reconsidered on appeal to the International Protection Appeals Tribunal.
The court refused all relief sought on the grounds argued and ordered the applicant to pay the respondents’ costs, subject to adjudication if the parties could not agree. It also ordered costs against her for an earlier unsuccessful motion to cross-examine a respondent’s witness.