Lemlem Husein Abdu
Lemlem Must Stay!
Latest update
Lemlem was released without conditions while Home Office considers her case for discretionary leave to stay in UK. She is now back in sheffield.
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NEW URGENT ACTION FOR LEMLEM:
There is a real opportunity to stop the removal of Lemlem Abdu by letting Teresa May know what you think before the immigration minister’s meeting with Lemlem’s MP on Tuesday morning.
Attached is a briefing about Lemlem, and a suggested model letter. Please adapt and use as you wish, and email to her at all these addresses:
mayt@parliament.uk
CITTO@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
UKBApublicenquiries@UKBA.gsi.gov.uk
Privateoffice.external@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
and/or fax to her at 020 7035 4745
Damian Green, the Minister for Immigration’s email address is ministerforimmigration@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
so you could also adapt the content and let him know your support for Lemlem’s case
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According to Paul Blomfield MP, “Immigration Minister Damian Green has agreed to my request to meet me and the Bishop of Sheffield and to halt Lemlem’s deportation until that meeting. We will be highlighting the support that Lemlem has within Sheffield, and that her deportaion would shame the UK.”
Please check again soon for further updates
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LATEST UPDATE – Lemlem’s been taken into detention -there is an emergency protest has been called for Thursday 21 June at 1pm at Sheffield Town Hall. – CLICK HERE
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Lemlem was born in 1950 in what is now Eritrea. In 1978 her village was burned down and her entire family was murdered
during an attack by Ethiopian forces. Her family and neighbours were targeted due to their support for the Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF), which was fighting for independence from Ethiopia.
Lemlem fled to Sudan and then subsequently to Saudia Arabia, where she obtained a position as a domestic worker. In 2000, Lemlem’s employers visited the UK and took her with them. She had a fall and injured herself when looking after the family’s children and has never fully recovered. Her employers stopped paying her wages as she could no longer carry out some heavy physical tasks. Then, in 2007, on a subsequent visit to the UK, the family abandoned her, with no money and no identification. Lemlem claimed asylum but has been refused. She is not allowed to work and receives no support, so has to rely on short-term help from a local charity, help which is now running out.
Despite her difficult position, Lemlem has a positive outlook. She is working hard to improve her English and is an active and well-loved member of her local community in Sheffield. The Home Office is threatening to deport her to either Eritrea, where the ELF of whom she has been a member for many years is now persecuted by the government, and where she no longer has any family or friends, or Ethiopia, where she has never lived and knows no-one. We, the undersigned, ask you to grant LemLem indefinite leave to remain in the UK so that she finally has somewhere safe she can call home.
Please sign the online petition.
Also download the following model letters to Meg Munn MP (Lemlem’s MP) and Theresa May MP (Home Secretary)