Namibia supreme court rules in favor of an Ethiopian immigrant

Government of the Republic of Namibia v Getachew (SA 21/2006) [2008] NASC 4; (15 April 2008): The appeal followed a High Court case in which an immigration officer committed perjury during his testimony in court resulted in N$65 000 being awarded to an Ethiopian resident of Namibia for the three months that he had spent in illegal detention in 2004 and 2005. The summons was instituted by Dereje Getachew who sued the Namibian Government for wrongful and unlawful arrest and consequential detention. The court unreservedly held that the trial judge erred when he determined that the respondent’s arrest was unlawful: ‘The arrest was justified on the basis of a clearly proved reasonable suspicion on the part of the arresting immigration officer that the respondent’s presence in Namibia was probably unlawful.’ The court decided the detention was lawful for the first period of 28 days, but was unlawful from 15 October 2004 to 27 January 2005.

Source: Legalbrief