HK rejects Pinoy gay man’s asylum bid
The High Court in Admiralty
THE High Court has rejected the asylum appeal of a Filipino gay man who did not want to return to the Philippines due to fears that his family and tribe might kill him for his being gay.
In a decision on April 3, Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan said the Director of Immigration and the Torture Claims Appeal Board were fair and did not commit any legal or procedural error in rejecting the non-refoulement claim of Alfred D.A., a native of Tuba, Benguet.
“I am unable to see any error in law or procedural unfairness in either decision of the Director or the Board, or any failure on their part to apply high standard of fairness in their assessment of the applicant’s claim,” Judge Chan said.
The applicant, 36, arrived in Hong Kong on October 22, 2014 as a tourist but he overstayed until the police arrested him on August 18, 2016.
While detained by the Immigration Department, he filed his non-refoulement claim on September 7, 2016 on the ground that he would be “harmed or killed by his family members and the Bago tribe for being a gay man if he is refouled to the Philippines.”
The applicant was born in Philex Mines, Tuba, Benguet, where his father was a mining worker. He has two elder siblings with his sister now married and residing in Hong Kong while his elder brother still lives in the Philippines.
“The applicant realized that he is gay when he was in in his teens and was frequently being teased by his elder brother at home and his schoolmates at school for his feminine behavior, and he always tried to hide his true sexual identity from his family and in particularly his neighbors most of whom were of Bago tribe who are said to be homophobic and reject gay people,” the judge said.
The applicant’s homosexuality became more apparent by the time he entered high school when there were occasions that his elder brother was teased at school “for having a gay brother†and he would come home “upset and hit him.”
“One day in 1996, his father confronted him at home and demanded him to confess his true sexuality. And when he admitted to be gay, his father hit him in front of the other family members and dragged him outside their house and hung him upside down from a tree for half an hour before releasing him with a warning that if he did not change he would kill him next time,” the judge said.
Feeling rejected, Alfred dropped out of school and left his family to take up shelter at his friend’s place in Quezon City for two weeks before moving to Sagada, Mountain Province. He later worked in beauty salons in Baguio and Quezon City.
“One day in about 2011 or 2012 while he was walking with several of his gay friends in Manila, they were teased by a couple of boys on the street for being gay who then started to throw things at them, with one of his friends being struck by a bottle in the head before the boys fled when the police arrived at the scene,” the judge said.
“Although he was not injured in the incident the applicant was shaken by the attack and became fearful for his safety, and in September 2014 after visiting a friend in Macau, he decided not to return to the Philippines and instead came to Hong Kong in October 2014 where he overstayed,” the judge added.
But on December 28, 2016, the Director of Immigration rejected Alfred’s asylum application after finding that that the “low intensity and low frequency of past ill-treatment from the applicant’s family and the Bago tribe is indicative of a low future risk of harm to him upon his return to the Philippines.
The immigration director also pointed out that reforms have been and are on-going in the Philippines, leading to positive results in recent years, including a number of government and (NGOs) providing support to LGBT groups and individuals and some cities having legislated anti-discrimination ordinances.
Alfred appealed but the Torture Claims Appeal Board on Nov. 9, 2017 dismissed his appeal, noting that “his fears are not well-founded or substantiated at all.
The board also noted that the applicant admitted that his brother and father “never meant him any real harm and that his father has since passed away.
The board added that while the Bago tribe may have disowned Alfred for his being gay, it found no evidence at all that would suggest that they intended to cause any serious harm.