Refugee in court win on claim to be gay

IN the latest twist in a threeyear saga which has already cost taxpayers $5.8 million in legal fees, the Federal Court has thrown out an Administrative Appeals Tribunal decision that the man is not gay.

It comes after the Federal Court in March blasted the AAT’s refusal of a partner visa for a Lebanese woman whose husband had been granted a protection visa because of his claim of homosexuality.

In this latest case, the Cameroonian national known as BZD17 arrived in Australia on a temporary visa in June 2014 and applied for a refugee visa the next month, claiming he was in danger because he was gay. Homosexuality is illegal in Cameroon.

He said his lover had been killed in a homophobic attack.

The man told the tribunal he had been in an arranged marriage since 2008, after his mother became ill and because he was supposed to be the next village chief.

Once in Australia, he had attended a gay Catholic organisation, several witnesses said.

But the AAT found the man had “consistently fabricated claims and . . . been deliberate in his actions in order to present himself to a range of people as gay . . . I am satisfied that the applicant is not homosexual”.

He was unable to provide marriage certificates or any evidence, including “social media” reports, of the assault on him and his male lover.

The Federal Court last week said the AAT had shown a “troubling lack of any attempt to engage” with evidence, including an aid worker, known as Mr C, who met BZD17 in Cameroon and later met him by coincidence at the Sydney Mardi Gras last year.

Two other witnesses, a Western Sydney Sexual Health Centre social worker and a counsellor working with gay and lesbian people, said he was, in their professional opinions, “unquestionably a gay man”.