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A gay asylum seeker from Cameroon faces deportation after failing to prove sexuality despite living with partner.

Charity volunteer, Valerie Ediage, who lives in West Bromwich arrived in England six years ago, fleeing his country for fear that if he were to remain there, his life would be at risk.

Homosexuals can be jailed for up to five years in Cameroon.

The Home Office has declined to comment specifically on his case but said asylum applicants need to show they face persecution, inhumane or degrading treatment to qualify for protection.

Ediage has said that he “lived in fear” while in Cameroon.

Speaking to the BBC he said: “In the UK I live freely.”

“I go to Gay Pride… gay pubs – you can’t in Cameroon. You fear prosecution and torture.”

He is currently awaiting the outcome of his latest asylum application, and has also provided the British government with letters of support from gay friends, while he lives with his boyfriend, also from Cameroon, who was granted UK residency.

“They [the Home Office] say I haven’t given them sufficient evidence but I have given them everything,” he explained .

Aimee Challenor, the equality spokesperson for the Green Party, endorses Ediage.

“Valerie has been a committed member of our community in Coventry,”she  said. “He has been instrumental in setting a LGBT migrant support group in Coventry, he has attended Pride parades in Birmingham….I cannot see how the Government has made this decision.”

 

 

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