ANI BT AHMAD MURTALA alias MURTALA, ANI BINTI AHMAD alias MURTALA, ANI BT AHMAD v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD

HCAL 1924/2023

[2024] HKCFI 2187

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 1924 OF 2023

Application for Leave to Apply for Judicial Review
NOTIFICATION of the Judge’s decision (Ord 53 r 3)

Following:

	consideration of the documents only;            or
	consideration of the documents and oral submissions by the Applicant in open court / the Applicant being absent in open court;

The application for leave to apply for judicial review be dismissed.

Observations for the Applicant:

1.  The Applicant is a 40-year-old national of Indonesia who arrived in Hong Kong on 27 March 2019 with permission to work as a foreign domestic helper until the expiration of her employment contract on 27 March 2021 or within 14 days of its early termination, but when her employment was prematurely terminated on 1 October 2020, she did not depart and instead overstayed, and was arrested on 12 November 2020 for which she was subsequently convicted and sentenced to prison for 2 months, and upon her discharge from prison and was referred to the Immigration Department for deportation, she raised a non-refoulement claim for protection on the basis that if she returned to Indonesia she would be harmed or killed by her husband and/or his creditor for failing to help him to pay his debts. She was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of her claim.

2.  The Applicant was born and raised in Indramayu, Jawa Barat, Indonesia. After leaving school she married her husband and raised a family with a daughter in her home district.

3.  In 2007 she started to work as a domestic helper in various places including Jordan and Singapore before coming to Hong Kong in March 2019 to work as a foreign domestic helper.

4.  Sometime in 2020 she was surprised to receive a telephone call from her husband in Indonesia demanding from her for a large sum of money to enable him to repay his debts due to some local loan shark, and when the Applicant was unable to do so, her husband became furious and threatened to kill her when she returned to Indonesia.

5.  Shortly thereafter she also started to receive threatening phone calls from his creditor making similar threats against her, and so later on 1 October 2020 when her employment was prematurely terminated, she was afraid to return to Indonesia and therefore overstayed in Hong Kong, and upon her subsequent arrest she then raised her non-refoulement claim for protection, for which she completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 13 August 2021 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

6.  By a Notice of Decision dated 26 October 2021 the Director of Immigration (“Director”) rejected the Applicant’s claim on all the applicable grounds including risk of torture under Part VIIC of the Immigration Ordinance, Cap 115 (“Torture Risk”), risk of her absolute or non-derogable rights under the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance, Cap 383 (“HKBOR”) being violated including right to life under Article 2 (“BOR 2 Risk”), risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under Article 3 of HKBOR (“BOR 3 Risk”), and risk of persecution with reference to the non-refoulement principle under Article 33 of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (“Persecution Risk”).

7.  In his decision the Director took into account of all the relevant circumstances of the Applicant’s claim and assessed the level of risk of harm from her husband or his creditor upon her return to Indonesia as low due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, that there is no evidence of any real intention of her husband or his creditor to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her for money to repay her husband’s debts, that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between her husband and his creditor without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant if resorted to, and that reliable and objective Country of Origin Information (“COI”) show that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in Indonesia with a large population of 275 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 1.9 million square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied adult with working experience to move to other areas of the country away from her home district in large cities such as Jakarta where it would be difficult if not impossible for her husband or his creditor to locate her.

8.  On 8 November 2021 the Applicant lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which she attended an oral hearing on 4 July 2023 before the Board during which she gave evidence and answered questions raised of her claim by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 12 October 2023 her appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision.

9.  In its decision the Board accepted the Applicant’s claim of threats from her husband and his creditor over his outstanding debts but found no evidence of any real intention of them to seriously harm or kill her that caused her to overstay in Hong Kong to seek protection, that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between her husband and his creditor without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant upon her return to Indonesia if resorted to as well as reasonable internal relocation alternatives for her to move safely to other parts of the country away from her home district without any risk of being located by her husband or his creditor that her claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.

10.  On 25 October 2023 the Applicant filed her Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, but no ground for seeking relief was given in her Form or her supporting affirmation of the same date in which she just repeated her claim as before but without putting forward any proper ground for her intended challenge. As such and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in her process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis for her intended challenge.

11.  As has been repeatedly emphasized by the Court of Appeal, judicial review does not operate as a rehearing of a non-refoulement claim when the proper occasion for the Applicant to present and articulate his claim is in the screening process and interview before the Immigration Department and in the process before the Board where the evaluation of the risk of harm is primarily a matter for the Director and the Board as they are entitled to make such evaluation based on the evidence available to them that the court will not usurp their role as primary decision makers in the absence of any legal error or procedural unfairness or irrationality in their decisions being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, as judicial review is not an avenue for revisiting the assessment by them in the hope that the court may consider the matter afresh: Re Lakhwinder Singh [2018] HKCA 246; Re Daljit Singh [2018] HKCA 328; Re Mudannayakalage Chaminda Pushpa Kumara [2018] HKCA 400; and Nupur Mst v Director of Immigration [2018] HKCA 524.

12.  In the Applicant’s case, the fact is that it has been established by both the Director and the Board in their respective decisions that the risks of harm in her claim if real are localized ones and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for her to relocate to other part of Indonesia, there is simply no justification to afford her with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526.

13.  Having considered the decisions of both the Director and the Board with rigorous examination and anxious scrutiny, I do not find any error of law or procedural unfairness in either of them, nor any failure on their part to apply high standards of fairness in their consideration and assessment of the Applicant’s claim.

14.  Moreover, the Applicant recently in July 2024 in writing requested to “close” her case as her problem in Indonesia has been solved that it is now safe for her to return to her home country.

15.  In the premises, as I am for the given reasons not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, and in view of her latest confirmation that it is now safe for her to return to her home country, I accordingly dismiss her leave application.

Where leave to apply has been granted, Applicants and their legal advisers are reminded of their obligation to reconsider the merits of their application in the light of the Respondent’s evidence

Form CALL-1