Charity worker under threat of deportation to Gambia

A woman who has lived in the UK for 16 years has been told she will be deported next month to the Gambia, despite the threat of her facing political persecution.

- HOLLY EVANS

Fatou Tamba, 55, was detained by immigration officials in Liverpool on 26 March, and has been held for the last month at Derwentside IRC in County Durham, where she claims to have been refused appropriate medical care and mental health support.

Her deportation to the Gambia, originally set for 22 April, was successfully halted – but she remains in detention, and her lawyer has now been served with a new removal date of 8 May.

Her brother Lamin Tamba, a British citizen, said: “Fatou and I have received death threats for our political views.

“If she is returned, she risks kidnapping, false imprisonment, or death. She has a family, a fiance, and a whole community who love her – she belongs here.”

Ms Tamba travelled to the UK in 2009 to visit her brother, deciding to remain due to the dangers posed by returning to the Gambia. Members of her family had been involved in political activism, and a change in the ruling party had led her to receive death threats.

She was also escaping an abusive marriage, having been married at the age of 14 to a man who was 30 years her senior. As a child bride, she had given birth to her son at the age of 15.