Asylum seekers in Glasgow explain the uncertainty and fear they face following plans to evict them if they are refused refugee status.
HER name is Hamida Mehraban. She’s a teacher. She endured death threats in Afghanistan for educating girls and disguised herself in a burka to evade the Taliban en route to lessons.
She is 65 years old and lives in Springburn with her husband, a 73-year-old engineer with serious heart problems that make travelling a death risk.
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One daughter is in Canada, a son is one of just a few asylum seekers in Scotland to secure a university place thanks to his first-class grades. Hamida is terrified. She is one of the 300 threatened with eviction as she attempts to secure a life in Glasgow.
The family has been hanging on to hope that they can build a future here for seven long years.
READ MORE: Home Office’s outsourcing of the asylum system is a UK scandal
Now they just hope to hang on to their flat and avoid an uncertain life on the streets.
This, Hamida fears, would kill husband Mohammad.
“We want to be happy,” she says. “We came here for a good life, but now our lives are almost over. These are our last years. Where will we go?”
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Shafiqa Mohammadi is asking the same question. The 35-year-old lives in Drumchapel with her husband, sons Khalid and Hamid, aged 15 and 13, and 16-year-old brother Mohammad Amiri.
“The children have no idea where they will go, what we will do,” she says. “I feel helpless. I blame the Home Office. It has the power and it pays the money. They need to consider that we are families, we have children going to school. If they lock our door, what happens to us?”
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