Solange Nlandu Therese Nsingu

Solange has been detained in Yarl's Wood IRC since early October and is due to be removed from the UK back to DR Congo, tomorrow Wednesday 3rd January 2007 @ 19.00hrs.

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is the site of one of the world's worst ongoing humanitarian crises. Although the country emerged from what has been called "Africa's first world war" in 2003 when the former warring belligerents came together to form a transitional government, credible mortality studies estimate that over 1,000 people continue to die each day from conflict-related causes, mostly disease and malnutrition but ongoing violence as well. Rampant corruption within the transitional government and pervasive state weakness allows members of the national army and members of armed groups alike to perpetrate abuses against civilians. International Crisis Group

Solange, 35, came to the UK from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in April 1998. She had been a prominent member of an association called the Mutualité de Bosenge (MUBO), formed in 1992, actively campaigning for peace and democracy at a time when the country was involved in a bitter struggle between the warring factions of Mobutu and Laurent D Kabila.

However, the members of this association met hostility from both camps and Solange's participation in demonstrations and marches finally got her arrested. After a period of imprisonment and torture, an uncle helped to secure her release and she was helped to leave the country and to come to Europe.

Even though the situation in the DRC has evolved considerably since Solange left, she says there is still a warrant out for her arrest. Indeed, in spite of the fact that a period of transitional government culminated in the staging of elections in 2006 that resulted in Joseph Kabila being designated head of state, the country is still in the grip of acute insecurity and elements of the opposition are sought out and persecuted. Two high-profile opposition leaders, Pastor Fernando Kuthino and Marie Therese Nlandu, were last year taken before military tribunals and falsely charged with possessing war arms and incitement to rebellion. They are currently fighting to survive in the inhuman conditions that prevail in Kinshasa's notorious Makala prison.

Since Solange's arrival in the UK she has adjusted well to British life, studying and working to support herself. Six years ago she married Ilunga Tshibangu also a refugee from DR Congo. Ilunga arrived here in 1994 and was granted indefinite leave to remain the same year.

Now, after eight years, the Home Office have decided to deport Solange to a country she barely knows any more, separating her from her husband and causing immeasurable heartache and difficulty for both of them. The immigration authorities want to wrench her away from the deep friendships and relationships she has formed here, from the community that has grown to love her, from her support structures, from her future.

After the best part of a nine years adjusting her life and aspirations to a new country, of forming solid bonds and putting down firm roots, the Home Office wants to send her back to Kinshasa - one of the world's worst living slums, where insecurity pervades every corner of human existence and eking out a living is practically impossible. Despite the recent elections, fighting continues unabated in the eastern regions of DR Congo.

Please don't let this happen to Solange. Write to the Home Office today to demand that she be allowed to continue her life in the UK with her husband and the friends who love her. It's been nine years. That must count for something.

How you can help Solange stay in this country:
Fax/write to Liam Byrne, Minister for Immigration, using the model letter 'Attached', which you can copy/amend/write your own.

Fax: 020 7035 4745 from outside the UK + 44 20 7035 4745

Or write to:
Liam Byrne, Minister for Immigration
Home Office, 3rd Floor, Peel Building
2 Marsham Street
London, SW1P 4DF

Please take time to notify the campaign of any letters/faxes sent:

Solange Nlandu Therese Nsingu Campaign
C/o "Liz Atherton"

End of Bulletin:

Source for this Message:
Solange Nlandu Therese Nsingu Campaign