One year after the federal government vowed to do more to give status to undocumented workers, Canada is pressing forward with deporting a personal support worker, separating her from her child and sending her back to the country from which she says she ran for her life.
Fatumah Najjuma, a 29-year-old, fled Uganda while pregnant in 2018 after she says she was disowned by her family and her life was put in danger for her religious and social affiliations.
For three years, she’s worked as a personal support worker in long-term care homes and at people’s homes, including during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s a role in which she says she’s found meaning, despite privately facing the terror of losing the life she’s built in the safety of Canada.
“The elderly, they really need our help,” she told CBC Toronto. “You assist them with doing everything so that they feel normal, like every other person.”
But “normal” is something Najjuma hasn’t been able to feel with her new life on the brink of collapse. Despite applying to stay in Canada on compassionate and humanitarian grounds in March, she faces deportation on Jan. 7.
“My mental health is worsening every day. I’m not sleeping, I’m not eating… Each day that passes, I get more scared.”
Najjuma is pictured here with her daughter on her third birthday in March 2022. It’s the last time she says she remembers being happy. Not long after, she was sent a deportation order and could now be separated from her little girl. (Submitted by Fatumah Najjuma)
Federal Immigration Minister Sean Fraser’s mandate includes working to “further explore ways of regularizing status for undocumented workers who are contributing to Canadian communities.” Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada says that work is underway, but that it cannot comment on programs or policies under development.
Fraser recently met with approximately 100 undocumented migrant leaders from around the country, to hear directly from them, the department added.
“As we advance our work on further programs, we will continue listening to experts as well as undocumented workers themselves… Until new policies are announced, the existing ones remain in effect,” spokesperson Jeffery MacDonald said in a statement.
‘Completely irrational,’ says advocate
That means while a change could soon be coming to ease the path to permanent residence for those like Najjuma, she is nevertheless set to be deported to Uganda while the specifics are ironed out.
That’s unacceptable to Syed Hussan, executive director of Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, who says his organization was told a decision on regularization would be coming this year.
“It’s completely irrational,” Hussan said.
“People are continuing to be ripped apart from their families, mistreated because they don’t have permanent resident status, despite the promise… A policy is being developed and deportations are happening at the same time.”
Federal Immigration Minister Sean Fraser recently met with approximately 100 undocumented migrant leaders from around the country, to hear directly from them, says Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada. (Patrick Swadden/CBC)
Najjuma’s deportation date approaches as another personal support worker and her son who also stood to be torn from their Canadian family members finally received their permanent residence.
Nike Okafor and her son, Sydney, had been in Canada for 19 years and waiting on their sponsorship application to be processed when they were suddenly hit with a deportation order by Canadian Border Services Agency.
As CBC Toronto reported, their nightmare finally ended last Monday, when they got word that their permanent residence application had been approved.
But for Hussan, “It’s not about finding exceptional cases, but to take on an unfair and discriminatory system that denies permanent residence to people… then wrenches them apart from their communities and puts them in situations of risk.”
According to the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, there are an estimated half million undocumented people in Canada, and another 1.2 million with study and work permits or claiming asylum — many who can’t access basic services and face exploitation by landlords or at work.
Thousands have been deported or face deportation since the immigration mandate a year ago, the group says.
IRCC says tens of thousands of temporary workers transition to permanent status each year. Of the 406,000 foreign nationals who became permanent residents in 2021, it says nearly 169,000 of them transitioned from worker status.
CBSA says it considers ‘best interest of the child’
In a statement to CBC Toronto, the Canadian Border Services Agency said it cannot comment on individual cases for privacy reasons, but that it has a legal obligation to remove those who are inadmissible to Canada under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, and who have removal orders in force.
“The decision to remove someone from Canada is not taken lightly,” the CBSA said, adding the agency only acts on a removal order “once all legal avenues of recourse have been exhausted.”
Syed Hussan with the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, says he wants to see all migrants in Canada be granted permanent residency, adding his group was told the federal government would be making a decision on a policy this year. (Krystalle Ramlakhan/CBC)
Najjuma’s deportation order came months after she had already submitted a humanitarian and compassionate grounds application. Humanitarian applications don’t automatically stop a deportation unless they receive the first stage of approval, but Najjuma says her application is still being reviewed.
Having a Canadian-born child also doesn’t prevent someone from being removed, the CBSA said.
The agency says it “always considers the best interest of the child before removing someone,” adding a family can be kept together by removing the child from Canada too.
That would mean uprooting Najjuma’s three-year-old daughter, Ilham, a Canadian citizen, to a country where her mother says her life too would be endangered.
Judge cites ‘moral debt’ owed to front-line workers
Toronto-based lawyer Vakkas Bilsin worked to help secure permanent residence for Okafor. While he is not involved in Najjuma’s case, the two women’s stories have much in common.
“In my opinion, Ms. Fatumah’s sudden removal from Canada is neither reasonable nor sensible before she receives the final decision on the outstanding humanitarian and compassionate application,” Bilsin said, adding he hopes someone in authority will hear her story and intervene.
In fact, in a ruling this year against the Immigration Appeal Division, a federal court judge indicated applicants who have worked as health care aids or on the front lines during the COVID-19 pandemic deserve special consideration.
“The moral debt owed to immigrants who worked on the front lines to help protect vulnerable people in Canada during the first waves of the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be overstated,” Justice Shirzad Ahmed wrote.
For now, as the clock ticks and her deportation approaches, Najjuma is trying to remain hopeful.
“All I want is to stay with my daughter, to be with her, to raise her in this country and not anywhere else,” she said.
PARIS (AP) — French judicial authorities are investigating the disappearance of two Paralympic athletes from Congo who recently competed in the Paris Games, the prosecutor’s office in the Paris suburb of Bobigny confirmed on Thursday.
Prosecutors opened the investigation on Sept. 7, after members of the athletes’ delegation warned authorities of their disappearance two days before.
Le Parisien newspaper reported that shot putter Mireille Nganga and Emmanuel Grace Mouambako, a visually impaired sprinter who was accompanied by a guide, went missing on Sept. 5, along with a third person.
The athletes’ suitcases were also gone but their passports remained with the Congolese delegation, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation, who asked to remain anonymous as they were not allowed to speak publicly about the case.
The Paralympic Committee of the Democratic Republic of Congo did not respond to requests for information from The Associated Press.
Nganga — who recorded no mark in the seated javelin and shot put competitions — and Mouambako were Congo’s flag bearers at the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games, organizers said.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A linebacker at Division II West Virginia State was fatally shot during what the university said Thursday is being investigated by police as a home invasion.
The body of Jyilek Zyiare Harrington, 21, of Charlotte, North Carolina, was found inside an apartment Wednesday night in Charleston, police Lt. Tony Hazelett said in a statement.
Hazelett said several gunshots were fired during a disturbance in a hallway and inside the apartment. The statement said Harrington had multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. Police said they had no information on a possible suspect.
West Virginia State said counselors were available to students and faculty on campus.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with Jyilek’s family as they mourn the loss of this incredible young man,” West Virginia State President Ericke S. Cage said in a letter to students and faculty.
Harrington, a senior, had eight total tackles, including a sack, in a 27-24 win at Barton College last week.
“Jyilek truly embodied what it means to be a student-athlete and was a leader not only on campus but in the community,” West Virginia State Vice President of Intercollegiate Athletics Nate Burton said. “Jyilek was a young man that, during Christmas, would create a GoFundMe to help less fortunate families.”
Burton said donations to a fund established by the athletic department in Harrington’s memory will be distributed to an organization in Charlotte to continue his charity work.
West Virginia State’s home opener against Carson-Newman, originally scheduled for Thursday night, has been rescheduled to Friday, and a private vigil involving both teams was set for Thursday night. Harrington previously attended Carson-Newman, where he made seven tackles in six games last season. He began his college career at Division II Erskine College.
“Carson-Newman joins West Virginia State in mourning the untimely passing of former student-athlete Jyilek Harrington,” Carson-Newman Vice President of Athletics Matt Pope said in a statement. “The Harrington family and the Yellow Jackets’ campus community is in our prayers. News like this is sad to hear anytime, but today it feels worse with two teams who knew him coming together to play.”
DETROIT (AP) — Joe Schmidt, the Hall of Fame linebacker who helped the Detroit Lions win NFL championships in 1953 and 1957 and later coached the team, has died. He was 92.
The Lions said family informed the team Schmidt died Wednesday. A cause of death was not provided.
One of pro football’s first great middle linebackers, Schmidt played his entire NFL career with the Lions from 1953-65. An eight-time All-Pro, he was enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1973 and the college football version in 2000.
“Joe likes to say that at one point in his career, he was 6-3, but he had tackled so many fullbacks that it drove his neck into his shoulders and now he is 6-foot,” said the late Lions owner William Clay Ford, Schmidt’s presenter at his Hall of Fame induction in 1973. “At any rate, he was listed at 6-feet and as I say was marginal for that position. There are, however, qualities that certainly scouts or anybody who is drafting a ballplayer cannot measure.”
Born in Pittsburgh, Schmidt played college football in his hometown at Pitt, beginning his stint there as a fullback and guard before coach Len Casanova switched him to linebacker.
“Pitt provided me with the opportunity to do what I’ve wanted to do, and further myself through my athletic abilities,” Schmidt said. “Everything I have stemmed from that opportunity.”
Schmidt dealt with injuries throughout his college career and was drafted by the Lions in the seventh round in 1953. As defenses evolved in that era, Schmidt’s speed, savvy and tackling ability made him a valuable part of some of the franchise’s greatest teams.
Schmidt was elected to the Pro Bowl 10 straight years from 1955-64, and after his arrival, the Lions won the last two of their three NFL titles in the 1950s.
In a 1957 playoff game at San Francisco, the Lions trailed 27-7 in the third quarter before rallying to win 31-27. That was the NFL’s largest comeback in postseason history until Buffalo rallied from a 32-point deficit to beat Houston in 1993.
“We just decided to go after them, blitz them almost every down,” Schmidt recalled. “We had nothing to lose. When you’re up against it, you let both barrels fly.”
Schmidt became an assistant coach after wrapping up his career as a player. He was Detroit’s head coach from 1967-72, going 43-35-7.
Schmidt was part of the NFL’s All-Time Team revealed in 2019 to celebrate the league’s centennial season. Of course, he’d gone into the Hall of Fame 46 years earlier.
Not bad for an undersized seventh-round draft pick.
“It was a dream of mine to play football,” Schmidt told the Detroit Free Press in 2017. “I had so many people tell me that I was too small. That I couldn’t play. I had so many negative people say negative things about me … that it makes you feel good inside. I said, ‘OK, I’ll prove it to you.’”
