Bridget O'Koro came to the UK in May 2004 when she was 24 years old. On the morning of 12th May 2008 loud banging on her door woke her up. It was six Immigration Enforcement and police officers. Terrified, Bridget let them in because she didn't know what was happening. Once the police were in her house, Bridget collapsed in shock and her terrified three year old daughter was taken to another room, crying loudly.

Very quickly, in less than half an hour, Bridget and her daughter were bundled into the van and driven to the Reporting Centre at Festival Court on Brand Street. In the van Osaivbie cuddled her mum and kept telling her that it would be all right. After two hours in the Home Office in Glasgow, Bridget and Osaivbie were driven in a van with blacked out windows to Dallas Court in Manchester and then eventually to Yarl's Wood IRC, arriving there after a ten-hour journey at 5:00pm in the evening.

The family was given removal directions for 10:00am on Friday 16th May having only three days to arrange legal representation to try and stop the flight but campaigners managed to do this and the family have remained in Yarl's Wood IRC.

Bridget had to flee Nigeria because she'd had a relationship with a man who was not a member of her Hausa tribe and was not a Muslim like her. When she became pregnant her father and members of the local Islamic Council threatened to kill her.

Five months after Bridget arrived in the UK, her daughter, Osaivbie, was born in October 2004. In March 2005, Bridget and her daughter had their asylum case refused by the Home Office. Then in November 2005, one week after her daughter's first birthday, and after living in Manchester for eighteen months, Bridget and her year old baby were told to come to live in Glasgow.

In August 2006, Bridget and her daughter were one of about forty families in Glasgow who were told to voluntarily self check in at Glasgow airport for a removal flight back to their country of origin.

Unable to get her lawyer to help her in the short time available, Bridget did not go to the airport, just like all but one of the other forty families. Terrified that she and her daughter would be arrested by immigration officials and put in a detention centre the next time she went to report because she had not gone to the airport, Bridget stopped going to report at the Home Office.

Bridget and Osaivbie then spent nine months sleeping on the floors of friends and supporters in Glasgow and living without any money until her lawyer lodged a fresh case in June 2007.

In August last year, the Home Office sent Bridget and her daughter a questionnaire as part of the 'legacy review' process being carried out on asylum cases made before April 2007.

Two weeks before Christmas, Bridget was given a letter telling her that her application for leave to remain under the legacy review had been refused on the grounds that she and her daughter "have not resided long enough in the UK to have established any significant strength of connections," and because she had failed to report for 10 months.

Bridget's lawyer lodged an appeal on Human Rights grounds but this was rejected after the Immigration Judge decided that the Legacy review was no different from any other asylum process and that it mainly dealt with cases that had not yet been resolved.

Bridget urgently needs your support. It is not true to say that Bridget has not been in the UK long enough to make significant connections with the local community - she has lived here for four years and has made many friends in the local community and many families who have not lived here for as long have been given leave to remain by the Legacy review. Several families who also absconded have been given leave to remain.

Bridget should not be punished because she failed to go to the voluntary self-check in at Glasgow airport a year ago. As a young single mother with a twenty one month old daughter she was terrified about being forced to return to Nigeria.

Please take urgent action to help this family

What you can do to help

All day today and onward to Saturday

1) Fax/Email/phone, Conrad Clifford, CEO, Virgin Nigeria, asking him not to carry the family back to Nigeria. A model letter (BridgetO'KoroVN.doc) is attached, which you can copy/amend/write your own. Remember to include these details; due to be forcibly removed from the UK to Nigeria on Saturday 5th July on Virgin Nigeria Airways flight VK296 from Heathrow to Lagos at 22.30hrs.

Fax: 01293 448035 from outside the UK + 44 1293 448035
Email:  customer.relations@virginnigeria.com
Phone 0844 412 1788

2) Please send urgent faxes/Emails immediately to, Rt. Hon. Jacqui Smith, Secretary of State for the Home Office. Please use the attached model letter (BridgetO'KoroJS.doc) which you can copy/amend/write your own version; if you do so, please remember to include the HO Ref O1075156.

Fax: 020 7035 0900 from outside the UK +44 20 7035 0900
Email:  Privateoffice.external@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk

Please notify the campaign of any messages sent:
Bridget and Osaivibie Campaign
C/o UNITY!
30 Ibrox Street
Glasgow
G51 1AQ
0141 427 7992
 info@unitycentreglasgow.org
 http://unitycentreglasgow.org/

End of Bulletin:

Source for this Message:
Bridget and Osaivibie Campaign