Lied to, tied up and locked in: Woman who arrived in Britain as a child exposes reality of UK deportation system

When Opelo Kgari was summoned to the Yarl’s Wood reception desk she didn’t think much of it. She had been staging a sit-in protest with fellow detainees when her unit officer tapped her on the shoulder and said they needed to have a chat. She asked if it could wait until later, but was told it would only take 10 minutes.

This was far from the truth. Over the next 12 hours, she and her mother Florence were strapped in waist restraint belts, placed in two separate vans and – chaperoned by a dozen officers – driven to Heathrow to be forcibly removed from Britain – the country Opelo has lived in since the age of 13.

“I went down to reception and she sat me in a little room,” the 27-year-old told The Independent. “Then another manager came in and she put on a pair of latex gloves. As soon as she came in with those on I knew what was happening.

“I couldn’t believe my unit manager had brought me there under false pretences. Just a few days ago we had sat together and talked about how we could improve the unit, and she was saying she’d do everything she can to make things better.

“And then a few days later she’s been really sly and brought me into the situation the way she did. I felt so betrayed and angry.”

Opelo had been in Yarl’s Wood for three months. She came to the UK from Botswana with her mother when she was just 13 years old. Despite going through the British education system, achieving good A-levels and developing aspirations to work in the UK’s charity sector, she had been thrown into Yarl’s Wood.

Now she was facing deportation. Guards searched her and said she could make one phone call before she had to hand over her mobile phone. With fight still in her at this point, she refused, arguing that as she was still in the centre she still had the right to have her possessions. But when she saw her mum brought through the door, she realised she had to make that phone call as soon as possible.

“I realised at that point that it’s absolutely pointless trying to argue with these people, and that the sooner I call my solicitor the better. I was only allowed to phone one number, so he was the only person I could call,” she says.

“I tried to argue the fact that my case is far bigger than just my solicitor. There are so many other people involved who can help me. But they said my solicitor was the only person who could help me. And that was the last time I could call anyone.”

Opelo informed their solicitor as to what was happening. Shortly after the phone call, the “removal team” arrived: a group of 12 officers employed by Tascor, a Capita-owned company contracted by the Home Office to escort detainees to charter flights. Opelo found herself being searched again, this time more stringently.

“We had our shoes taken off and we were searched right down to our socks,” she said, her voice breaks. She pauses as she tries to hold back the tears. “I find I can deal with a lot of it as best I can, but when I get searched – especially in the way that they did – it makes me feel so so small, and almost like a criminal, like I’ve done something really wrong.

“I broke down when she was searching me. She stripped me of the last bit of dignity that I thought I had.”

As this was happening, Opelo saw that their possessions were being loaded into the vans: “Officers had gone into our rooms and started chucking all our clothes and belongings into laundry bags. I recognised my gym bag and realised it was all of our stuff. It’s really hard to deal with and figure out how best to cope with it except just go with it until it’s over.”

As she was wearing just a pair of leggings and a top, Opelo was told she could change into jeans, but two officers were required to go into the toilet with her. They turned their backs to her, but she wasn’t allowed to close the door.

Opelo and her mother were then “bound” in restraint belts, which Tascor has the right to use following an “individual risk assessment”. Official Home Office guidelines state: “It may be decided that the use of a waist restraint belt provides the most effective method of managing a safe escort”.

Despite not trying to physically resist the removal, the women were placed in the “restricted” restraint belt, which meant their wrists were strapped to the waist belt, limiting their arm movement.

“They’re made of seatbelt material, but much thicker,” Opelo recalls. “They put it around you and on your wrists, so you can’t really move, you’re literally bound. I couldn’t move my arms more than 30cm from my body. And it has handles on either side on your ribs so that the officers can physically move you if say you didn’t want to walk. So they can pull you along.”

At this stage, Opelo breaks down in tears.

“I was already stripped of all dignity, so you just kind of go with it. But you just feel… like you’re not even a person anymore. They don’t even treat you like a person, it’s like you don’t matter to anyone. And the whole time my mum was saying that’s my baby, don’t treat her like that.”

She and Florence were led into two separate vans, accompanied by six officers in each. As far as Opelo knew, the next time she would see her mum could be on a flight bound for a country she hardly remembers, away from everything she knows.

Opelo – who throughout her time at Yarl’s Wood has tried to maintain a friendly rapport with the officers there, blaming the Home Office for her situation rather than them – is sympathetic towards the staff removing her, explaining that they “tried” to have conversations with her in the van.

“They really did try, but I had mentally shut down by this point” she says. “Bless the woman sat next to me. She was so, so lovely. But I just couldn’t find it in myself to try. I think a lot of it stemmed from the way we were treated while we were still in Yarl’s Wood and handed over to them.”

The vans arrived to the outskirts of London ahead of schedule, six hours before the flight was due to leave, so the removal team decided to park outside one of Tascor’s offices situated close to Heathrow until the time was more appropriate to go to the airport.

“They parked the vans across from each other so they could all come out and talk to each other, but they had to remain in the van,” Opelo remembers. “We were there for a few hours just waiting. I had to stay in the van, separate from my mum.”

Throughout the process, Opelo and Florence’s solicitors had been desperately trying to get an injunction from the courts to halt the removal. Three hours before the flight, Florence received a call saying they had succeeded. They would not be removed that day.

“It was really good news, but they said that until the Home Office confirms they had to continue with the operation and take them onto security. Even though the judge had made a decision, they still had to wait on the Home Office,” says Opelo.

“But it felt like a massive cloud had just shifted, the mood shifted, the officers relaxed a little bit. They said it was such good news; they took the belt off me. They were really pleased that we didn’t have to go through with it.”

An hour later, the officers got confirmation of the injunction from the Home Office, and set off back to Yarl’s Wood, the women still in different vans. Due to bad traffic, they didn’t get back until around 10pm, and then had to wait in reception for two hours.

“We had literally left earlier in the day so I thought they should still have everything in place. But we sat and sat and sat. They had a TV so I put Made in Chelsea on – the most mindless show. I watched that and two other shows. Three other people coming in that night. After two and a half hours we got to go to our rooms,” says Opelo.

“They had to search everything again. The whole process took another 40 minutes again. So we didn’t get back into our rooms until about 1am. I imagine a lot of money was wasted.”

Since The Independent previously spoke to Opelo in February, at which point she had been in Yarl’s Wood for five weeks, there is a notable change in her demeanour. She maintains her ease of communication and is even able to laugh at times, but following the deportation attempt – the second she has been subjected to within a matter of weeks – the optimism and energy she had before has petered away.

“I’ve probably [had] one proper meal since I’ve been back. I have no appetite. Apart from sending stuff off to solicitors, I’m just in my room. My friend brought in some colouring books to take my mind of things,” she says. “I’ve not been as talkative as I normally would be. One of the officers said I don’t have a smile on my face anymore.

“It’s because I don’t have much to smile about. It’s really difficult now to find something to smile about. You have to find joy somewhere, but the situation just gets harder and harder. I sometimes feel like I can’t carry on."

There is little doubt that Opelo – a confident and intelligent young woman who devoted her time to volunteering for UK charities before she was unexpectedly detained in Yarl's Wood – will have been damaged by her treatment by the Home Office over the last few months. The widespread public backing for her to remain in Britain is a source of hope, but regardless of her fate, what she has been through is likely to stay with her for years to come.

“I’m trying to keep it together. I’ve decided not to see the psychiatrist in the centre because there’s only one and other people in here who need it much more than me," she says. “But I'm pretty certain that when I come out I'll need to see a well-trained professional to go over the last few months of what I’ve been through. It’s extremely naïve to think it won’t affect me.

“Being here is just mental torture, and the Home Office does this so they can tire you out and wear you out. It’s not okay to put people through this. No one should ever have to go through anything in this proximity.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Earlier this month, the court issued an injunction against the removal of Florence and Opelo Kgari although their immigration status remains unchanged. We have noted the injunction and are carefully considering its implications.”

They said that they monitor the use of restraint by custody officers closely to ensure that the use of restraint is reasonable, necessary and proportionate, and operate a comprehensive complaints system if detainees feel that they have not been treated in accordance with Home Office standards.