A family of seven threatened with deportation has been reprieved after a campaign that began in a Devon classroom, spread around the world, and led to the government being bombarded with thousands of protest letters.
Last night more than 10,000 people had joined a Facebook group devoted to saving the family from being sent back to Nigeria, and the youngsters who launched the campaign from a sixth-form common room vowed to keep up the pressure.
The mother, Helen, who has asked for the family name not to be published, and her six children had lived in Plymouth for four years. They claimed asylum because they feared they would be persecuted if they were sent back. Helen was afraid her 14-year-old son, Emmanuel, could die in Nigeria because he has sickle cell anemia and she could not afford the medication.
Friends of the family at Stoke Damerel community college in Plymouth were outraged when they were seized by immigration officials and held in an immigration center, ready to be flown back to Africa. Alex Stupple-Harris, 17, who was in the same year as two of the brothers, Mac and Winston, told how he went back to school on the evening he heard about his friend’s plight and began printing off protest letters. They wrote to MPs, the Home Office and even executives of the airline that was to fly the family home. The campaign quickly spread through the school. "Thirteen-year-old boys were coming up to me and asking for 150 letters. They would come back with them all signed. The Facebook campaign has also been amazing."
The family was permitted to stay for three more weeks and on Wednesday officials are to look at the case again.