DURU CHARLES ANAYO v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD/NON REFOULEMENT CLAIMS AND ANOTHER

CACV 283/2018

[2019] HKCA 150

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CIVIL APPEAL NO 283 OF 2018

(ON APPEAL FROM HCAL 549/2017)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon L Chan J (giving the Judgment of the Court):

1.  By a judgment dated 4 December 2018, this Court (Yeung Acting CJHC, Yuen JA and L Chan J) dismissed the applicant’s appeal against the decision of Deputy High Court Judge Woodcock (“the Judge”) given on 19 June 2018 refusing to grant him leave to apply for judicial review.

2.  The facts and issues in the appeal, as well as the court’s reasons for dismissing it, are set out in our judgment.[1]

3.  By a notice of motion filed on 12 December 2018, the applicant applied for leave to appeal against our judgment to the Court of Final Appeal.  

4.  In the Notice of Motion, the applicant provided the following:

(i)   There were errors in law in the decisions and the decision makers just relied on the country of origin information (“COI”) and the factual information which were against him in order to reject his claim. 

(ii)   The actual life in Nigeria was different from what was mentioned in the COI and the Nigerian officers and courts preferred to ignore the overwhelming evidence of violence towards minorities. Thus, the decisions to reject his claim were biased, formulaic and calculated.  

5.  In compliance with the directions given by Master Au-yeung on 14 December 2018, the applicant lodged his written submission on 27 December 2018.  In substance, the applicant repeated his fear of returning to his home country Nigeria because he believed that he would be persecuted, or even killed by Islamic supporters and local officials as he was a Christian and not accepted by the Islamic society.  He further complained that the decision makers did not comply with the high standard of fairness as required in determining his torture claim as stated in R v Home Secretary, Ex parte Bugdaycay [1987] AC 514 at 531, R v Home Secretary, Ex parte Doody [1994] 1 AC 531 at 560 and Secretary for Security v Sakthevel Parbaker [2005] 1 HKLRD 289.

6.  We have duly considered the applicant’s notice of motion and his written submission.  Pursuant to paragraph 3 of Practice Direction 2.1, this application is processed on the papers without any oral hearing.

7.  Under section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance, Cap 484, leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal may be granted 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 Court of Final Appeal for decision.  Here, the applicant just reiterated his complaint and disagreement against the decisions made by the Director and the Board which were duly considered and correctly rejected by the Judge at the lower court hearing.  The applicant did not have reasonably arguable basis to challenge the Judge’s findings. 

8.  For the reasons that we gave in our judgement of 4 December 2018, we did not see any prospect of success in the applicant’s intended appeal against the Judge’s order.  None of the questions raised by the applicant in the notice of motion or in his written submission involve an arguable point or a question of great general or public importance.  Nor do we see any ground to grant leave on the “otherwise” limb.  The statutory criteria for granting leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal under section 22(1)(b) of the Court of Final Appeal Ordinance (Cap. 484) are not met.

9.  Accordingly, we refuse to give the applicant leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal and dismiss his notice of motion.