At our last members meeting we heard about the work of our media group at our meeting. Our media group contains people with lived experience of immigration detention in the UK and who are powerful communicators. We are working with them to tell more people about the inhumanity of the immigration detention system in this country.
Our first such venture is Mama Stella’s story, which is the powerful account of a British citizen wrongfully imprisoned in immigration detention for almost a year.
Born in France, raised in Kenya and legally naturalized as a British citizen, Stella’s life unraveled when the Home Office rejected her passport application, wrongly accusing her of using fraudulent documents. What followed was years of harassment and a prolonged period of wrongful imprisonment inside Yarl’s Wood immigration removal centre.
Yet, Stella emerged as a fierce advocate, helping others fight their cases even while detained. Stella’s story is a David-and-Goliath tale of survival, solidarity, and the human dignity at stake in the government’s new immigration strategy. We are grateful to our friends at the International Detention Coalition for publishing this story and we encourage you to take a look at it and spread the word. Many more people need to read this story. Thanks for your help!
