Queer Asylum Seekers: Caught Between Persecution and Homonationalism
In2022 Adeniyi Raji, a gay man seeking asylum in the UK due to homophobic persecution in his home country of Nigeria, was deported by the Home Office. Adeniyi was told he faced death if he returned to Nigeria; his partner had been murdered and Adeniyi had himself been attacked, prompting him to flee to Britain.
Despite this, the UK government decided that Adeniyi hadn’t sufficiently proved that he was gay, and that it was safe for him to return to Nigeria. He was deported, along with several other asylum seekers, on 29th June 2022. The UK likes to portray itself as a liberal haven for LGBTQIA+ people, however, the unfair and unequal treatment of queer asylum seekers complicates this narrative.
Cases like Adeniyi’s shine a light on the conflict between Britain’s projected image and its poor treatment of both queer asylum seekers and many members of the UK queer community. Such cases also highlight the way inclusive liberal narratives around gay rights have paradoxically come to form part of the UK’s exclusionist anti-migrant rhetoric — part of a socially constructed “migrant crisis”, rooted in nationalistic concerns about jobs and welfare, and the threat foreign cultures allegedly pose to “our way of life”.
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