There has been widespread believe that the government of The Republic of The Gambia has reached an agreement with the EU countries for the deportation of Gambian asylum seekers especially from Germany.
Gunjur News Online has gathered from reliable sources in Germany that there are currently about 2500 Gambians awaiting deportation in the Southwestern state of Baden-Württemberg.
The Interior Minister of Stuttgart - Thomas Strobl was quoted by stuttgarter-zeitung.de in November that “In order to increase the number of deportation numbers to The Gambia, he is looking around Baden-Württemberg for suitable airlines on the open market, who can also provide security support in addition to the aircraft and the crew.” Currently, deportations from Germany are done through chartered flights organised by the federal police, but Interior Minister Strobl wants to use a different tactic to increase the number of successful deportations to Gambia and other countries by using private airlines who also provide security personnel to accompany deportees to their home countries. His proposal was presented to the conference of the Federation’s Interior Ministers several weeks ago. Strobl was also quoted as saying that since repatriations to the Western Balkans using his model has been successful, he hopes that “the federal government will also support his request to the Gambian government and set the course on diplomatic level”
According to the German Federal Government, around 11,000 migrants were deported by air in the first half of 2018 alone, including 211 Gambians. However, the Stuttgart Interior Minister expects the deportation numbers of Gambian migrants from Germany to increase rapidly now that the Gambian government has agreed to send liaison officers to Germany to help identify Gambian asylum seekers. In the past, deportation of Gambian migrants fail because of missing identity documents, unexplained identity of the asylum seekers or because there was not enough transport capacity. This is expected to change according to the Interior Minister. A Gambian asylum seeker in Germany who spoke to Gunjur News Online on condition of strict confidentiality confirmed that there are Gambian undercover immigration officers in Germany who are tricking Gambians into speaking any of the Gambian local languages to identify them as Gambians only to be processed for deportation back to The Gambia.
One of the deportees from Germany who arrived on board the Germania flight to Gambia on Tuesday confirms that he was deported without a passport or identity document. Could the Tuesday deportation of allegedly 71 Gambians from Germany a start of an increase and frequency of removals of Gambian migrants from Germany as suggested by the Stuttgart Interior Minister? Is The Gambia government indeed assisting the German Federal Government in identifying Gambians for deportation? These questions have been lingering in the minds of many and with time, truth shall prevail.