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OVER 13,000 PEOPLE have signed an online petition calling for a halt to the deportation of a Dublin City University student facing the threat of torture if he returns home.
Zimbabwean national Shepherd Machaya could be deported within days after his permission to remain in Ireland expired on 21 October.
The former pastor fled his homeland after members of ZANU-PF, the party co-founded by Robert Mugabe, tortured and threatened to kill him in an attempt to force him to join the party.
After he left Zimbabwe, Machaya’s sister told him that one of his best friends died after suffering catastrophic injuries when he was tortured by the party’s members.
Machaya, a second year Management of Information Technology and Information Systems student at DCU, has been living in Direct Provision in Laois for the last nine years.
He completed a Level 5 course in Software Development in Portlaoise College in 2017, before being admitted to DCU under the University of Sanctuary scholarship scheme, which allows refugees to study there.
However, after his bid for asylum failed earlier this year, Machaya was told by the Department of Justice to leave Ireland by 21 October.
“From this moment onwards, he could be deported,” DCU Students’ Union President Vito Moloney Burke tells TheJournal.ie.
“I think we have a few days, but that’s about it.”
Campaigners say that although his family remains in Zimbabwe, Machaya has made friends in Ireland, which he calls his “second home”, and that he has contributed to the country.
Burke added that despite contacting Charlie Flanagan and the Department of Justice on multiple occasions, he has received no response.
“We’ve had growing support on a national level. The most heartening thing is that members of the public are getting involved and signing the petition.
“Hopefully more attention is brought to Shepherd’s case and this is discussed in the Dáil tomorrow.”
TheJournal.ie has asked the Department of Justice for comment.
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Hindsight should be this government’s manifesto.
@Will Roche: “Say the line, Bart!” “Lessons were learned.” “Yaaaayyyyyy!”
@JusticeForJoe: I am waiting for them to say, “Sure we are not as bad as the lads next door”
‘said that there was no evidence that they were bought for a celebration for that evening’
Would that picture not stands as evidence?
You and your departments seem to make a lot of mistakes if the job is to big for you resign. It seem you are not running your departments properly and you are only interested in what your E. U. masters to you
Yes you should’ve raised the issue with the Secretary General instead of raising glasses of bubbly
comments section must of been left open by mistake (:(:
Another great witch hunt about to begin fascinating that was not one gathering of journalists anywhere in Ireland during lockdown
So a wonderful virtuous and honourable industry
Or ………..Omerta as was the case with Irelands most famous cocaine snorting DJ
@Jerry Slattery: Holding people in positions of power and influence for valid and proven reasons is not a witch hunt. By your photo I assume you are old enough to remember the days in which Irish politicians routinely and blatantly paraded their indifference and even indignation to being held to account for their own actions (often corrupt). Coveney is no f-o-o-l and he knows this should have been dealt with differently.
@David A. Murray: Holding to account people……
@Jerry Slattery: Oh, won’t somebody please think of the witches! You seem to think the people who make our laws should be free to decide which of those laws they have to obey, themselves. Have I got that right?
Coveney should have become a whistle-blower…lol
These tribunals over nonsense ‘storm-in-a-teacup’ allegations are such a waste of tax payer money and government time when there is much more pressing business like the rising cost of living and housing etc. Seems like when one “scandal” dries up another one rears its head.. I’m all for accountability and standards in public office, but people need to see the big picture and get over it.. Have these public accounts or oireachtas committee appearances or internal investigations ever amounted to anything other than a headline that just fades over time?
have your say