Tribunal decisions

The decision

Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber) Appeal Number: PA/03228/2016

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Heard at Field House
Decision & Reasons Promulgated
On 18 April 2017
On 21 April 2017

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE CLIVE LANE

Between

harim hasan babakr
(ANONYMITY DIRECTION not made)
Appellant
and

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr K Gayle, Counsel instructed by Elder Rahimi Solicitors (London)
For the Respondent: Mr T Wilding, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

DECISION AND REASONS
1. The appellant, Harim Hasan Babakr, born on 17 May 1993 and is a citizen of Iraq. By a decision dated 17 March 2016, the Secretary of State rejected the appellant’s claim for asylum and gave directions for the appellant’s removal from the United Kingdom. The appellant appealed to the First-tier Tribunal (Judge Ransley) which, in a decision promulgated on 21 November 2016 dismissed the appeal. The appellant now appeals, with permission, to the Upper Tribunal.
2. The appeal turns on the appellant’s credibility. At [24] the judge found that the appellant had been inconsistent in his evidence. The appellant claimed to have been in a relationship with a woman, Niyaz, since 2013. The appellant had said at interview that Niyaz’s family were “from the big Agha family”. The judge went on to find that, “however ...the appellant changed his story by saying that Niyaz was from the ‘Hamawand’ tribe. The respondent [had] contended that this material inconsistency in the appellant’s evidence has damaged his credibility”. The appellant asserts that he used the term “Agha” to describe any family in Iraq which had particular power or influence; he did not intend it to refer to a particular family by the name of Agha. Indeed, in his interview at question 46 the appellant describing his girlfriend’s family said that “they are from Agha family many times we went for asking her hand and they did not approve (sic).” When asked in the next question to say if the “Agha family means anything” the appellant said “they are influential”. He clarified in answer to question 48; “in our country it’s like if somebody is Agha that means they have a lot of power”.
3. I have considered whether the judge erred in her analysis. I am not satisfied that the judge should have found that the appellant had been inconsistent in his evidence on this matter. It is correct to say that, in answer to question 49, the appellant described the Agha as “like a big tribe” but he does not actually say that the Agha is a big tribe. By analogy, it is rather like the appellant saying that his girlfriend’s family were aristocrats or maybe part of the Mafia; he did not, as Judge Ransley’s analysis suggests, stated at one time that she was a Smith and at another a Jones.
4. Otherwise, I find the judge’s analysis to be accurate. The appellant complains that the judge had failed to understand that he met his girlfriend secretly because they met on the conjoined roofs of their respective homes and therefore did not need to go out into the street or in public. However, the judge noted [28] that the appellant had also said that the “two family homes were on two different roads”. The appellant also submits that his father’s error in his evidence (as to the year in which he had arrived in the United Kingdom) was an obvious mistake upon which the judge has placed too much weight. The attribution of weight to the various items of evidence was a matter entirely for the judge. The appellant’s father may have had an excuse or an explanation for his discrepant evidence, but this does not mean that the judge has wrongly understood the facts as they were presented to her.
5. Further, also regarding the evidence of the appellant’s father, Mr Gayle, for the appellant, submitted that the judge should have gone behind the refusal of entry clearance issued by the ECO (Entry Clearance Officer) in May 2011 because it contained significant inaccuracies. The father had not, however, appealed against the decision claiming that he had not received the notice of refusal within the 28 day time limit. The judge expressly finds [39] that she did not accept the father’s explanation and gave reasons for her finding. There was no reason at all why Judge Ransley should not take the contents of the refusal at face value given that it had not been successfully appealed. Accordingly, I reject Mr Gayle’s submission.
6. The remaining question is whether the judge’s findings regarding the appellant’s comments on his girlfriend’s family (Agha) are so wrong as to undermine the decision as a whole. I find that, whilst the judge may have failed fully to understand the appellant’s evidence regarding the Agha, she made numerous other credibility findings which are not perverse but which are supported by an accurate analysis of the evidence. This is not a case where a “faulty” finding of fact has infected the remaining findings or was of such significance in the analysis as to have tipped the balance against the appellant. Notwithstanding the judge’s error, I find that she has given other reasons, which remain sound, for finding the appellant and his father were not credible witnesses. Mr Gayle told me that he now had DNA evidence to show that the father and appellant were related; however, as he acknowledged, that was not evidence which had been before the First-tier Tribunal. I am not satisfied that the judge has erred in law for the reasons asserted in the grounds of appeal or at all. The appeal is dismissed.

Notice of Decision
7. This appeal is dismissed.

Signed Date 20 April 2017

Upper Tribunal Judge Clive Lane