Ahmed, R (on the application of) v Immigration Appeal Tribunal

In an asylum appeal, factual errors do not automatically invalidate a determination. They may do so where they are strange, material and unexplained, particularly when the decision turns on the applicant’s credibility. A bare or thin credibility assessment becomes especially problematic when the errors suggest that the adjudicator may have confused the applicant or the case. The determination must be assessed as a whole. Where its reasoning is thereby unsatisfactory, the decision should be set aside and the matter remitted for proper consideration.

The appellant, a Pakistani Ahmadi, challenged the refusal of permission to appeal by the Immigration Appeal Tribunal. The adjudicator had dismissed his asylum appeal, finding that he would not face persecution for a Convention reason and disbelieving aspects of his account.

The adjudicator repeatedly referred to Egypt and evidence given in Egyptian, although the appellant’s case concerned Pakistan and his evidence had been given in Urdu/Punjabi. The Immigration Appeal Tribunal refused leave, relying in part on an alleged flight from Karachi to non-existent Cameroon islands and the improbability of a direct flight to Cameroon. The central issue was whether the adjudicator’s reasoning was sufficiently reliable and adequate to constitute a proper adjudication.

1. Appeal allowed. The matter was remitted to the Immigration Appeal Tribunal, with the respondent ordered to pay the legally aided appellant’s costs, subject to detailed assessment.
2. The determination had to be considered as a whole. Errors of fact will not invariably require a decision to be upset, but these errors were unusually strange and concerned the country from which the appellant had come, the country where he was allegedly wanted by the police, the country to which he would be returned, and the language in which he gave evidence.
3. The credibility reasoning was thin. The adjudicator merely stated that the appellant had low credibility regarding his preaching of the Ahmadi faith, without explaining why. That deficiency was material because the case turned substantially on whether the appellant was credible when he said that he had preached the faith, since the adjudicator accepted that more active Ahmadis could face persecution in Pakistan.
4. The combination of the unexplained factual errors and inadequate credibility reasoning created a real concern that the adjudicator might have confused the appellant with another person or the case with another case. The reasoning was therefore unsatisfactory and the adjudication could not safely stand.
5. The decision was distinguished from R v Immigration Appeal Tribunal ex parte Haile [2001] EWCA Civ 663, where expressions in the determination were slipshod but the essence of the reasoning remained clear and sustainable.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): [2004] EWCA Civ 552. Permission to appeal was granted and the substantive appeal was heard. The appeal was allowed, the matter was remitted to the Immigration Appeal Tribunal, and costs were ordered against the respondent.
• Administrative Court, Queen’s Bench Division: Jackson J refused permission to seek judicial review of the Immigration Appeal Tribunal’s refusal of leave to appeal.
• Immigration Appeal Tribunal: Refused leave to appeal from the adjudicator’s dismissal of the asylum appeal.
• Adjudicator: Mr Grant D Birt dismissed the appellant’s asylum appeal.