The story behind the 'alleged Stateless Zimbabwean' woman stranded in Kenya

The Department of Immigration Services has dismissed claims by a woman camping at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport that she is stateless and has nowhere to go.

Reacting to claims by 43-year-old Agnes Nemakonde alias Agnes Alexander Namakonje, head of investigations at the Immigration department, Josiah Musili, said she had failed to prove how she arrived in Kenya prior to her arrest in Lodwar in October last year.

He said there is no record of her arrival in Kenya at any of the country's border posts. There also was no record indicating that she was deported from the UK as she claimed.

On Sunday Agnes claimed she was deported under guard of the UK immigration authorities and brought to Kenya under the mistaken identity that she is Rebecca Chitanga, a Kenya or Malawian national. She claimed she was a Zimbabwean national but that had renounced her nationality when she fled the country in 1995. Agnes said she sought asylum in the UK following the murder of her then partner, a British hotelier and farmer killed by ZANU-PF veterans when they invaded their farm.

The passport allegedly presented at the Immigration office at JKIA was that of Chitanga and not herself. She said the Kenya immigration office turned her away and she was taken to Malawi and South Africa whose immigration offices also rejected her as she was not their national. Yesterday, Musili said her name and that of Rebecca Chitanga does not appear in their records of persons deported from the UK. "She was arrested in Lodwar in the company of another person by the name Clement Makonde. Both are suspected to be Zimbabwean nationals," said Musili.

Agnes and Makonde were arraigned in court under Criminal Case number 880 of 2011 for being in Kenya illegally and were each fined Sh55,000 or serve a year in prison. According to Agnes, a Lodwar based businessman who runs a supermarket and a bookstore in the town paid her fine after she served two months in prison and she was released.

Yesterday, Musili confirmed that an 'unknown person' paid the fine for Agnes and said her co-accused is still in prison. "She was brought to Nairobi in February and placed in police custody at Kileleshwa as officers tried to verify her status and nationality. They hit a snag when both the Zimbabwean and UK High Commissions denied she was their citizen." Musili said that while she was being held at Kileleshwa, Agnes went on a hunger strike prompting the police to seek the intervention of UNCHR.

A letter from the UNCHR dated February 23 acknowledges that Agnes is "a person of concern to them" and requests that the repatriation be withheld. UNCHR offered to accommodate her at the transit facility in Nairobi as they sought to verify her status and nationality. Agnes is said to have turned down the offer and demanded immediate repatriation to the UK.

A letter from the British High Commission dated the same day says that Agnes is "not a British national and has no permission to enter or stay in the UK". Informed of this, Agnes yesterday threatened to walking to from Nairobi to the UK. "I am tired and instead of dying here I am thinking of walking back to my husband in the UK," she said referring to Scottish national David Alexander whom she married in July last year, three months before she was allegedly deported. Immigration officials said they had the airport security and the police to arrest Agnes and hand her over to the UNCHR as investigations continue.