Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - January 31, 2015, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE A13 winnipegfreepress. com CANADA WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, SATURDAY, JANUARY 31, 2015 A 13 The third annual SAFE Work Awards recognize the people who go the extra mile to build a culture of safety and health at work and across the province. Nomination criteria and forms are available online at safemanitoba. com . Deadline for nominations: February 27, 2015 The award goes to... . An Employer . Worker . Safety and Health Professional or Educator . Safety and Health Committee or Group Whose commitment to SAFE Work goes above and beyond! I F you were under attack with no one to protect you, what lengths would you go to for safety? Belo Hilary, 42, has changed his name, lied to officials about his birthdate, about being gay and about his travels. Now immigration officials say he can't be trusted and he has to go back to Nigeria, where gays are lynched and homosexuality is against the law. When Hilary walked across the border into Canada June 23, 2013 from North Dakota, he thought he'd reached the promised land. Instead, he's been held in immigration detention in Headingley Correctional Centre and expects any day to be removed from Canada by immigration officials who question both his credibility and sexual orientation. "( Hilary) failed to credibly establish his personal identity ( and) did not establish, on a balance of probabilities, that he was homosexual," the Refugee Appeal Division ruled. But when you're locked up in Canada, how do you prove your identity? How do you find witnesses who will testify to being your lover in a country where homosexual acts are punishable by up to 14 years in prison and vilified by a society that views them as evil and satanic? How do you prove you're telling the truth when you've been forced out of fear to lie for your survival? " When you're a sexual- minority person living in a country with homophobic laws and social attitudes, your whole life centres around hiding and hiding your identity - doing anything not to be outed," said Horst Backe, the founder of Reach Out Winnipeg. " Then, suddenly, when you come to a country where being gay is, for the most part, acceptable, it's quite a shift," said Backe, with the advocacy and refugee- sponsorship group set up to help people in places where they're persecuted for their sexual orientation. The group has helped with some of Hilary's legal fees. " It's not surprising that people are engaging in some level of deception because that's what they've done for survival," said Backe. When Hilary was first interviewed by a Canada Border Services Agency immigration enforcement officer in June 2013, he lied about his date of birth and that he'd ever gone by any other name. In Nigeria, he'd changed his name to Belo Hilary and was forced to move after his landlord walked in on him with a naked man and reported him to police for having gay sex. When asked why he lied to a Canada border officer about his birthday, he said he did so out of fear. " I don't know what I was doing," he said. After his landlord in Nigeria reported him to the police, he fled in 2012 to the United States. His asylum claim was rejected because he had entered the U. S. before in 2001 and was deported in 2007. The second time he arrived, in Detroit in 2012, he was offered detention or an electronic anklet bracelet to monitor his whereabouts until he could be removed to Nigeria. He took the GPS device. A U. S. Department of Homeland Security investigator's report said Hilary left Michigan contrary to the terms of his release and was on a bus headed towards Chicago, but on the phone he told an investigator he was headed to New York. The GPS tether showed he ended up in Minneapolis, where he visited " known areas where Somali gangs operated and were known locations where fraudulent documents were created," court records said. He removed the bracelet on May 22, 2013, and headed into Canada, where RCMP apprehended him. He was then arrested by the Canada Border Services Agency for entering Canada illegally without a visa. On July 4, he made a refugee- protection claim. He admitted to the Canadian enforcement officer he had made a refugee claim in the U. S. in 2001 and was deported in 2007. When asked why he had lied by telling U. S. officials he was born in Sierra Leone, he had no answer. " The immigration judge will understand," said Hilary. But the judge did not understand. On Jan. 7, Federal Court Judge Michael Phelan dismissed Hilary's application for a judicial review. Hilary's lawyer, Bashir Khan, said the border services agency is getting Hilary's travel documents ready to send him back to Nigeria. Khan is working pro bono to prevent Hilary's removal and has contacted the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights ( OHCHR) at the Secretariat of the United Nation in Geneva, Switzerland. If the UN office intervenes on Hilary's behalf, authorities could keep him in the Headingley jail until that appeal is exhausted, which could take two years, said Khan. A Nigerian church group in Winnipeg offered a $ 2,000 bond to house Hilary and keep an eye on him. An Immigration and Refugee Board adjudicator rejected the group's proposal. Locking up someone who's not a criminal is a waste of taxpayers' money and human potential, Backe said. " All the money spent on his imprisonment could have easily been spent on integrating him in society," said Backe. " Much less would've been spent in helping him become a contributing member of society." carol. sanders@ freepress. mb. ca ' When you're a sexual minority person living in a country with homophobic laws and social attitudes, your whole life centres around hiding and hiding your identity - doing anything not to be outed' - Horst Backe, the founder of Reach Out Winnipeg Gay Nigerian man fears persecution Lawyer appealed to United Nations for help as man awaits deportation By Carol Sanders BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Reach Out Winnipeg founder Horst Backe ( left) and Mark Rabnett ( right) previously sponsored Hamed, a gay man from Iran. Belo Hilary A_ 13_ Jan- 31- 15_ FP_ 01. indd A13 1/ 30/ 15 10: 45: 14 PM ;