Couple from Quebec and their 3 children are deported to different continents

A federal court judge has upheld the deportation order of a man living in Trois-Rivières, Que., to his home country of Nigeria, but delayed the deportation of his wife and children to the Philippines until July 7.

The ruling gives Arlyn Huilar just over a week to provide the Canada Border Services Agency with a document proving that her youngest child, who is 6, has citizenship of the Philippines and can be deported there with her and her two siblings .

Huilar and her husband, David Abijade, had appealed the CBSA’s deportation order, which would mean their children would be separated, with their youngest, Carlsen, sent to Nigeria with Abjiade and the two eldest – Kaela, 11 and Bradley, 9 – sent to the Philippines with Huilar.

Their lawyer, Sabrina Kosseim, says that while she welcomes the judge’s decision to prevent the children from being separated, the family is still on the verge of being split between distant continents within hours.

Ajibade has been ordered by the CBSA to present himself at 3 a.m. at Jean Lesage Airport in Quebec City

Kosseim is now rushing to ask both the United Nations Human Rights Committee and Federal Immigration Minister Sean Fraser to intervene on behalf of the family.

“Emotionally it just kills us”: Ajibade

Huilar and Ajibade met on a matchmaking website and got married in Nigeria in 2009. Their mixed-race children faced racism and hostility in the Philippines, after which they narrowly evaded a kidnapping in Nigeria, Kosseim said.

Their hopes of finding a safe haven in Canada ended when the CBSA ordered the family deported – to two different continents.

“Emotionally it kills us all,” Ajibade said on the phone on Wednesday, ahead of the court’s decision. “This was the first time we felt at home.”

In a short conversation following the news that Abijade would be evicted early Thursday, he said the family was devastated.

“We’re just trying to protect the kids,” he said.

Kosseim requested that the deportation of her clients be postponed until they receive a document from the Philippines proving that the youngest child has citizenship there, so that the six-year-old would not be separated from his older siblings.

When the CBSA denied that request, it turned to the Federal Court to request a stay of deportation.

Kosseim also asked the judge to suspend the family’s removal from Canada pending the outcome of their application for permanent residence on humanitarian and merciful grounds, which could take months. That request appears not to have been granted.

“I’ve never seen a situation where CBSA is about to break up siblings. I’ve never seen that,” Kosseim said.

The eldest child in the family, Kaela, 11, is deeply affected by the prospect of seeing her family fall apart.

“She was always happy and lively, and when she heard about it, there was a big change in her,” said Huilar. “She had to go through some therapy sessions.”

A love story, but not a safe haven

In the early years of their relationship, the couple traveled back and forth between their home countries to see each other. Ajibade, who studied electrical engineering, worked at a bank to detect fraud, and Huilar was a teacher in the Philippines.

But when Kaela was born in the Philippines in 2011, the couple said she faced racism and discrimination there, so she and her mother joined Ajibade in Nigeria, where their second child, Bradley, was born in 2013.

The family also faced problems there. In a country ravaged by civil war, the Ajibade-Huilars were seen as foreigners. They say they were blackmailed by police officers and harassed on a regular basis, and that Kaela and Bradley were abducted in the nick of time as they left school one day.

They fled to the United States, where their third child, Carlsen, was born in 2017.

Kosseim said the family did not know they had a deadline to seek asylum in the US until they consulted a lawyer seven or eight months after arriving there and discovered that the six months before had passed.

The couple decided the only place they had any chance of seeking asylum was in Canada, so they crossed into Quebec via Roxham Road in May 2019.

Two weeks later, they applied for asylum, but their application was rejected in February 2022. They appealed, but were rejected again last July.

According to a summary filed in court by Kosseim, the Immigration and Refugee Board acknowledged that the Ajibade-Huilars had suffered discrimination, but did not find they faced “persecution within the meaning of the refugee definition”.

Ajibade said he understands that the family’s situation is complicated by the fact that he and Huilar are from different countries. He said that while their love story has caused hardships, it has also helped them through those hardships.

“It’s like out of a storybook or Hollywood,” he said. “We met and we kind of just clicked, and we just saw the vision from there.”

Finally home

Since arriving in Quebec, the family has settled in Trois-Rivières, 150 kilometers northeast of Montreal, where Huilar and Ajibade first found work in an Olymel meat processing plant. They have since found better paying jobs: Huilar works as a data entry at an airline company. and Ajibade works as a foreman at nights and weekends.

Ajibade attended workplace training on Tuesday evening, hoping to take on a higher position.

“I try to keep my mind on my work, as a distraction,” he said.

The children go to the same school and already speak fluent French. They all made friends in the small town.

“The community here is great,” Ajibade said. “They showed us what true love is.”

Considered ‘best interests of the child’: CBSA

In response to a request for comment from CBC News, a CBSA spokesperson wrote in an email that the agency “considers the best interests of the child in performing its mandated duties.”

“Canada is trying to balance its UN obligations while complying with legal requirements when handling cases involving minor children,” the email said.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada said the department could not comment on individual cases.

“We understand that these kinds of situations are incredibly difficult and sympathize with the families,” it said in a statement.