'Despair' for asylum raid mother

Ms Gaye and her son face being deported next week

A mother taken to the Dungavel detention centre with her son after a dawn raid has spoken of her despair at the prospect of being deported.

Fatou Felicite Gaye and her four-year-old son Arouna, who was born in the UK, face forced deportation to Ivory Coast on 18 May.

The raid came weeks before the launch of a pilot project aimed at ending the detention of the children at Dungavel.

Ms Gaye told BBC Scotland she had "nowhere to live" in Ivory Coast.

Speaking to BBC Radio's Scotland Live programme from the Lanarkshire detention centre, she spoke of her shock when immigration officials arrived at the door of her home in the Sighthill area of Glasgow at about 0700 BST on Thursday.

I heard they do not anymore put children in detention Fatou Felicite Gaye

She said her son had been ill with asthma in the lead up to the raid, and she had previously presented proof to officials.

Ms Gaye, 38, said the raid was the third time Arouna had been detained - the first being when he was aged two. He had been psychologically traumatised by the raids, she claimed.

Ms Gaye, who has had five applications for asylum rejected, added: "When they came to my house they started knocking the door.

"I told them 'hold on I am coming' because my son was not feeling well and I was using the pump for asthma on him.

"They started forcing the door and I opened it and said 'listen to my son he is not feeling well'.

"It was before 7 o'clock and they started telling me 'Ok you have to go'."

It had been a "shock" when the UK Border Agency officials arrived at her door as "I heard they do not anymore put children in detention," she said.

Ms Gaye told the programme: "Honestly I don't know what they are going to do, but for me I am just thinking about my son."

'Extreme care'

"It would be difficult for me [in Ivory Coast]. I don't have anywhere to live, I don't have family I don't have anything."

Campaigners described the raid as "heavy-handed" and "shocking".

They staged a protest outside the UK Border Agency's office in Brand Street in Glasgow on Friday morning.

Campaigners staged a protest at the UK Border Agency's office in Glasgow

Asylum policy is reserved to the UK Government and the Scottish Government is opposed to forced removals and the detention of children.

A UK Border Agency spokesman said on Thursday it did not comment in individual cases.

He added: "Individuals who have been found by our trained case owners and the independent courts to not be in need of international protection are expected to return home.

"The UK Border Agency always prefers that people leave the UK voluntarily rather than have their return enforced but where an enforced removal is necessary family enforcement visits are undertaken with extreme care, allowing as much time as possible for packing and for everything to be clearly explained."

A pilot project due to launch in June will see failed asylum seekers housed in former council flats in Glasgow before they return to their own countries.

The Scottish Government has said it hoped the project would lead to the ending of children being detained at Dungavel.

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