Playwright Lydia Besong wins battle to stay in Britain six years after fleeing Cameroon

By Paul Britton

Lydia Ebok Besong (right) and Bernard Obem Batey.

A campaigning playwright and her husband have won a six-year asylum battle to stay in the country. Lydia Besong fled Cameroon with her husband, Bernard Batey, in 2006. She claims she was persecuted, jailed then raped in prison because of her political activities. They were members of the Southern Cameroon National Council, an organization campaigning for independence for southern Cameroon.

The couple have been seeking asylum in Britain ever since and set up home in Bury, fighting a high-profile campaign with the backing of RAPAR, a Manchester-based human rights organization. Mrs. Besong’s play, titled How I Became An Asylum Seeker, has been performed to critical acclaim in Manchester, Liverpool, Salford and London.

The couple have fought and lost a series of appeals against Home Office decisions refusing them leave to remain. It resulted in celebrity authors joining forces last year in a bid to prevent their deportation. A letter was sent to the government signed by more than 30 leading writers, actors and journalists, including Brick Lane author Monica Ali, Stockport-born journalist and author Joan Bakewell and About a Boy and Fever Pitch author Nick Hornby. Former Children’s Laureate Michael Morpurgo, whose novel War Horse has been transformed into a Hollywood blockbuster by Steven Spielberg, and top stage and screen actress Juliet Stevenson, led the campaign.

 {It has been} revealed by the couple’s legal team that they have finally won leave to remain. The couple's legal team said the UK Border Agency has five days to appeal the decision. Lydia, 40, said: "I am very pleased with the decision and hopefully it will be a final decision. The outcome is just brilliant although the UK BA still has some time to appeal. "We want to thank all our supporters. Myself and my family were just looking for safety and now we feel safe. "It has been horrible over the last six years. We have been in detention and we have not been allowed to work. But ,now our lives are free and we are so, so grateful. It has been horrible but now we feel sure that we can look forward to our lives." Gary McIndoe, their solicitor, said an asylum tribunal ruled that their political and cultural activities would place them at risk should they be returned to Cameroon.

Mr. McIndoe, of Latitude Law, Manchester, said: "The tribunal has recognised that Lydia and Bernard’s political and cultural activities will place them at risk if they are returned to Cameroon. This is a deeply important victory for everyone interested in ensuring the safety of our refugees." The couple, long standing human rights activists who have been detained twice during their asylum fight, claimed asylum when they arrived in the UK at the end of 2006 and were housed in Rochdale, where they were members of the congregation at St Ann’s Church, Belfield.

 They now live in Bury and are members of the Bury AcaPeelers Choir. Lydia’s most recent play Down with the Dictator – recently performed in Manchester and Bury – is set in Cameroon and explores themes of power, political corruption and censorship.

 -Manchester Evening News