2nd Canadian stranded in Kenya
Last Updated: Wednesday, August 19, 2009 | 7:42 PM ET Comments118Recommend50
CBC News
Members of Canada's Somalian community say their relationship with the Canadian High Commission in Nairobi, Kenya, is strained following a second case of disputed identity.
Abdihakim Mohammed, a 25-year-old Somalian-Canadian, has been stuck in Kenya for three years, accused by Canadian diplomatic officials of being an imposter.
Mohammed is autistic. His mother took him to Somalia five years ago because doctors believed being around extended family could help him.
After leaving Mohammed in Somalia with his grandmother, his mother returned to Canada.
However, when she tried to bring him back to Canada three years ago, she was told the person travelling with her was not her son because he didn't look like his passport photo.
The case remains unresolved despite offers by Mohammed's mother to undergo DNA testing.
"I was upset with them, the Canadian Embassy, they didn't want to give me my passport, my Canadian passport — I don't know why," Abdihakim Mohammed told CBC News.
Mohammed Dalmar, a family friend and a manager at Ottawa's Catholic Immigration Centre, said the federal government has a problem at the High Commission in Nairobi.
"The relationship between the Somali community and the High Commission in Nairobi is damaged and we need to repair it," Dalmar said.
No embassy
Canada has no embassy in Somalia, so people from that country must travel to Nairobi for consular services.
Dalmar said people travelling to Somalia through Kenya are targeted by corrupt Kenyan border agents.
"If you go through the airport, they will target you," he said. "They will say you have to pay some money as a bribe. Otherwise, they make life difficult for you."
When bribes aren't paid, the traveller can be accused of using a false passport. Now in at least two cases, it seems Canadian consular officials have sided with the Kenyans when this has happened.
Not drawing conclusions
Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon isn't willing to draw any conclusions yet, but he said senior officials are looking into what happened.
"We're not looking for anything else than the truth," Cannon said.
In an earlier case of disputed identity, Suaad Hagi Mohamud, 31, who was visiting her mother in Kenya, had been unable to leave the country since May, when local authorities said her lips did not look the way they did in her four-year-old passport photo.
Canadian consular officials called her an impostor, voided her passport and urged Kenyan officials to prosecute her, even after Mohamud handed over numerous pieces of identification, offered fingerprints and finally demanded that her DNA be tested. She was charged on May 28 with identity fraud.
After a DNA test proved Mohamud was who she said she was, a Kenyan judge agreed to drop the charges, which included using another person's passport and being in Kenya illegally. Mohamud returned to Toronto and was reunited with her 12-year-old son on Saturday.
The Canada Border Services Agency has also launched an internal investigation into how the case was handled.