MOHAMMED EKBAL v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD / NON-REFOULEMENT CLAIMS PETITION OFFICE

CACV 362/2019

[2021] HKCA 286

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CIVIL APPEAL NO 362 OF 2019

(ON APPEAL FROM HCAL NO 38 OF 2018)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon S T Poon J (giving the Judgment of the Court):

1.  On 9 December 2019, the Applicant filed a Notice of Motion to apply for leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal against this Court’s judgment of 2 December 2019. In that judgment we struck out and dismissed the Applicant’s appeal against the decision of Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan on 26 July 2019 striking out and dismissing his application for leave to apply for judicial review.

2.  Section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance, Cap 484 provides that an appeal shall lie to the Court of Final Appeal (“CFA”) at the discretion of this Court or the CFA if the question involved in the appeal is one which, by reason of its great general or public importance, or otherwise, ought to be submitted to the CFA for decision.

3.  In his Notice of Motion for leave to appeal to the CFA, the Applicant raised the following matters in support of his application:

“I would like to infomr the Honourable Court that there is some error in law in my decision. Decision maker just relied on COL Information and my previous facts which were in favor while rejecting my claim. Acual life occur different situation then what is mentioned in COL Information. The Officer and cours prefers to ignore the overwhelming of the evidence of this violence towards minorities searching for unrealistic silver lining. The Decision is betrary a bias and formula approach unlikely fairly access the danger of my life and clearly not reasonable.” [sic]

4.  Pursuant to the Court’s directions of 12 December 2019, the Applicant lodged his written submissions in support on 23 December 2019. Those submissions consist largely of general statements of law quoted from case law, without identifying how they specifically relate to or apply in this case.  However, paragraph 5 of his submissions states that the Torture Claims Appeal Board acted in a procedurally unfair manner by failing to properly assess his credibility.

5.  The Applicant’s submissions fail to engage with the reasons given in our judgment of 2 December 2019 for striking out and dismissing his substantive appeal, and do not raise any discernible or arguable ground for disturbing our judgment.  The matters raised in his Notice of Motion and his written submissions fail to pinpoint any specific error in our judgment or the judgment of the court below.

6.  In any event, in the circumstances, we do not consider that there is any question of great general or public importance or which otherwise ought to be submitted to the CFA for determination.

7.  For these reasons, we refuse to grant leave to appeal to the CFA, and dismiss the Applicant’s Notice of Motion accordingly.