The Success Story on Refugee Legal Aid Clinic and Community Sensitization Mission Conducted by KNCHR Legal Services Division and North Rift Regional Office in Eldoret
The Success Story on Refugee Legal Aid Clinic and Community Sensitization Mission Conducted by KNCHR Legal Services Division and North Rift Regional Office in Eldoret
Introduction
Eldoret Town is a home to a number of refugees and asylum seekers from different countries across the continent. The Department of Refugees Services (DRS) has a regional office based in Eldoret town to manage all matters pertaining to refugees and asylum seekers within the urban jurisdiction and its environs. As such the Commission through the Legal Services division and the KNCHR North Rift Regional Office vide the Haki na Ushirika Project, organized a legal aid and sensitization forum for the Eldoret Refugee Caseload on 8th and 9th November 2023 to sensitize them on the their rights and welfare matters as well as identify deserving cases for appropriate legal intervention and assistance. The mission also included a prison visit at Eldoret Main Prison to attend to refugees and asylum seekers who fell in conflict with and in contact with the law as well as intervention for an asylum seeker who had been arrested and detained at Bungoma Police Station.
Department of Refugees Services officer engaging with refugees during the sensitization forum/Legal Aid Clinic for Refugees in Eldoret, Uasin Gishu County
Through the two forums at Kapsoya sub-County, a total of 30 refugees and their community leaders were sensitized on the national, regional and international legal framework governing refugee management in the country and offered legal advice on various issues raised by the participants during the two fora. The team also paid courtesy visits to the DRS and National Government Administration Officers (NGAO) offices in Eldoret where the need for intensive capacity building for various government offices, CSOs and the refugees on refugees laws, rights and duties as well as the up-coming Marshal Plan for the implementation of the Global Compact on Refugees. A call was made to the Commission to partner with DRS in organizing sensitization forums and develop strategies for engaging actors in telecommunication, Banking, Micro-Finance and education sectors to appreciate the refugee situation and offer them access to their services, empowerment and training opportunities.
Legal Intervention for an Arrested Asylum Seeker
During the Mission, the team received a report of an asylum seeker who had been arrested and detained at Bungoma Police Station and proceeded to Bungoma for intervention and secured the released of the asylum seeker of Jamaican nationality. This was after liaising with DRS and confirming that indeed Jamaican has submitted an application for status and was awaiting his appeal decision save that his asylum seeker pass had expired and ought to have been renewed. The asylum seekers was therefore released to the team and escorted to the DRS office in Eldoret where he was issued with a movement pass to travel to Nairobi to check on the progress of his pending appeal decision for asylum. The team also established that the Immigration Officers and the police who were handling the case did not have adequate knowledge and refugee management procedures and documentation hence the decision to detain the asylum seeker. As such, the team undertook to organize a training on the same to avoid such illegal arrests and detention of refugees and asylum seekers.
Legal Aid at the Eldoret Main Prison
The team visited Eldoret Main Prison to offer legal aid and support for refugees and asylum seekers in conflict with or in contact with the law. Among the cases identified included the Criminal Case No. 10 of 2017 Republic V Moses Lucky Everest from Lodwar High Court where the accused inmate, a refugee from Burundi was convicted for manslaughter and sentenced to murder to 20 year in prison. However, the inmate informed the team that by the time of passing the sentence, he had served 5 years in remand yet the same was not considered when he was being committed to prison.
KNCHR officers engaging with a refugee inmate at the GK Eldoret Main Prison, Eldoret
The team noted that this action was inconsistent with section 333 (2) of the Criminal Procedure Code and Policy 7.11 of the Judiciary Sentencing Policy Guidelines 2016 that required the courts to consider the period served in remand by the accused person. As such, the team flagged the case for further action from both an administrative and judicial point of view to ensure access to justice for the refugee inmate.