Ejerssa v Secretary of State for the Home Department

When reviewing an asylum tribunal’s credibility assessment, the court must consider the determination as a whole. A challenge to an individual discrepancy, omission or inference will not establish an error of law where the tribunal has addressed the evidence in a balanced and conscientious manner. Tribunals may consider omissions in an account and comment on the claimant’s own evidence, provided they do not apply an impermissible approach to credibility. Cultural context and relevant background material must be considered, but a complaint that the tribunal gave insufficient weight to them does not itself disclose an error of law. The recognised asylum standard of proof remains applicable; permission should be refused where the determination shows no misdirection on that standard.

The appellant, an Ethiopian national of Oromo ethnicity, claimed asylum after arriving in the United Kingdom as a seaman. He relied on alleged membership of the Oromo Liberation Front, past detention and mistreatment, and a risk arising from the detention of family members and his activities in the United Kingdom.

The AIT accepted some aspects of his account but rejected the core claim, including his alleged OLF membership, and dismissed his appeal against the refusal of asylum and removal directions. The appellant applied for permission to appeal, alleging errors in the credibility assessment, treatment of omissions, cultural context, background evidence and the standard of proof.

1. Application dismissed. The AIT’s determination disclosed no error of law.
2. Cultural facts and conditions in the society concerned may be relevant when assessing evidence. However, the AIT had adopted the natural reading of the solicitors’ letter concerning OLF membership, and no arguable legal error was shown. In any event, the point was unlikely to have affected the result in light of the AIT’s reasoning taken as a whole.
3. The AIT was entitled to identify omissions in an earlier statement as curious and to give reasons for that conclusion. This did not amount to treating the appellant as disbelieved merely because every fact had not been included in one statement, and was not inconsistent with the relied-on UNHCR guidance or any principle of law.
4. The AIT was entitled to comment on the appellant’s own evidence concerning the Ethiopian Shipping Lines. The criticism that another credibility point was weak was only an invitation to reargue the facts. Credibility findings must be assessed in the round, and these findings could not properly be attacked when so considered.
5. The AIT dealt with the case and background material thoroughly and fairly. The contention that the accepted parts of the account, viewed with the objective evidence, required a favourable asylum decision was not established.
6. The recognised asylum standard of proof, identified by the House of Lords in Sivukamaran, was not misstated or misapplied. The application for permission to appeal was therefore dismissed. The formal order was: “Application dismissed.”

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): On 2 November 2005, Lord Justice Laws dismissed the application for permission to appeal against the AIT’s decision.
• Asylum and Immigration Tribunal: The AIT dismissed the appellant’s appeal against the Secretary of State’s refusal of asylum and consequential removal directions. Its determination was promulgated on 27 May 2005.
• Immigration Appeal Tribunal: Under transitional statutory provisions, the IAT had allowed an earlier appeal from an adjudicator and remitted the case for rehearing.