Tribunal decisions

The decision

IAC-FH-NL-V2

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Number: IA/20972/2015

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Field House
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 7 December 2016
On 2 February 2017

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE ALLEN

Between

mohsin iqbal
(anonymity direction not made)
Appellant
and

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: No appearance or representation
For the Respondent: Mr C Avery, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

DECISION AND REASONS
1. This is the appeal of Mr Iqbal against the respondent's decision of 27 May 2015 refusing his application for leave to remain in the United Kingdom. He appealed that decision to a Judge of the First-tier Tribunal who dismissed the appeal. He sought permission to appeal and permission was granted by a First-tier Judge on 1 September 2016. There is no appearance by, or on behalf of Mr Iqbal today. There is a fax from the previous representatives dated 6 December 2016 stating that they were unable to get further instructions and asked to come off the record and that was acknowledged the same day. I am satisfied from the notice of hearing that notice of the date, time and place of the hearing was sent to the appellant and as a consequence that it is appropriate to proceed to hear the appeal.
2. I will start with the decision of the respondent. This was a decision on the basis that he had applied for indefinite leave to remain in the United Kingdom on the basis of the compassionate circumstances outside the Immigration Rules. The matter was nevertheless considered within the Rules and outside and the decision was reached to refuse the application.
3. The case is complicated by the fact that various accounts have been given by Mr Iqbal at different times. There was a statement which was the basis of the application that his family had arranged his marriage to a woman who was the daughter of a well-known local gangster and he had a fear of them and it was said that the claim raised issues which might properly be considered as a claim for asylum or humanitarian protection rather than application outside the Rules and the appropriate procedure for applying for asylum was set out in the decision but it was said that he had provided no evidence to support the written statement. He did not meet the requirements of the Rules.
4. At the first hearing of Mr Iqbal's appeal he denied being at risk of being killed and implied at least and indeed expressed the view that the matter had been fabricated by the then representatives who I should add were not the representatives who came off the record yesterday. There was an adjournment because of these allegations and the matter was re-listed, as I say and heard in the First-tier Tribunal on that day. That was an appeal which was determined on the papers and there was a statement from Mr Iqbal who spoke about a risk that he feared from a land mafia group as he described it who had attacked him and threatened him and said that he should get his mother's property signed over to their names and he said that he could not relocate elsewhere in Pakistan. There was no other documentary evidence submitted. The judge considered that these facts amounted to a protection claim and went on to consider the merits of that claim and found a lack of credibility in the failure to mention it previously, a lack of supporting evidence and a number of other significant unexplained issues in the delay for example having taken place and the judge as a consequence dismissed the appeal on asylum grounds, humanitarian protection grounds and Articles 2 and 3. No attempt had been made to show that he could succeed under paragraph 276ADE or Appendix FM or Article 8 outside the Rules and as a consequence the appeal was dismissed.
5. The grounds of appeal express disagreement with the refusal of the claim for international protection and an error of law was claimed on a not very coherent basis. It was interpreted by the judge who granted permission as a challenge to the jurisdiction of the judge to consider the appeal under the Qualification Directive when the appeal was lodged against the refusal of the application under Article 8. I will come back to that in a moment. The grounds then go on to quote various paragraphs from the judge's decision that argue that the appellant had misinterpreted the question being asked and had thought that he was being asked about the threat he had expressed earlier due to the marriage rather than the property threat. There is reference to the appellant's dissatisfaction with the conduct of the previous solicitors.
6. Issue is taken with the judge's conclusion that there was a lack of supporting evidence on the basis that the appellant was in minimal contact with his mother and also with the other significant unexplained issues to which the judge referred such as the delay. It was said that he had not realised that his life was in danger and then again disagreement is expressed with the conclusions under the Rules on the basis that there were significant obstacles to his integration back into Pakistan and the findings in respect of paragraph 117B. It was said he had provided sufficient interest in seeking to improve his English language skills and as to whether or not he could be said to be self-sufficient.
7. For myself I find it rather hard to read those grounds as specifically taking issue solely with the judge's conclusion that the claim fell to be considered as a claim for international protection given that both of the grounds are concerned with addressing the judge's decision in that regard and I do not see any arguable error even if the point in the grant of permission were appropriate. Clearly the statement that was put before Judge Ferguson at the hearing on 18 March 2016 involved the claim of risk on return on the basis of the threat from the land mafia group and the judge was entitled to give and gave proper consideration to that and found with good reasoning that there was no merit to the claim and that it lacked credibility for the reasons that he set out at paragraphs 13 to 15 of his decision and although he did not say much about the Article 8 claim he really did not need to say very much. Everything he said was entirely coherent and sound and as a consequence he dismissed the appeal on that basis also. In my view no error of law in the judge's decision has been shown and as a consequence the appeal is dismissed.

Notice of Decision
The appeal is dismissed.
No anonymity direction is made.

Signed Date

Upper Tribunal Judge Allen