When Kabanga Tshilonda faced the likelihood of deportation in January, he felt lost in a desert.
“If you have no water and are thirsty, the first drop of water you see, you don’t think whether it will cure your thirst. You just drink,” he said last week.
In his case, relief appeared in the form of two middle-class American kids who have never been to his homeland, Zaire. Rarely have six academic credits apiece been earned with such beneficial effect.
It’s because Adam Mosser and Karl Francis, second-year law school students at Georgetown University, are spending a chunk of the current semester at the school’s Center for Applied Legal Studies. Like other clinical programs run by law schools nationwide, it offers credits in exchange for toiling on real problems.
For Mosser, who graduated from Boston University, and Francis, who went to Stanford, the problem was Tshilonda. He’s a mining technician turned accountant–and longtime foe of Zaire’s President Mobutu Sese Seko, the tyrant whose 32-year reign is on the ropes.
As a result of activities with a prime opposition group at home, Tshilonda had been arrested, imprisoned, tortured and poisoned. He was forced to spend weeks naked and without sanitation, developing awful rashes from the heat and excrement.
His uncle, a diplomat turned dissident, was murdered. A brother and two sisters disappeared.
So when the opportunity arose in 1995 to come briefly to the United States for an environmental conference, he took it. His plan, he swears, was to return home to his wife and three children, but that may never happen now.
While here, he learned he would be the object of government scrutiny upon returning. As his visitor’s visa expired, he went to the Immigration and Naturalization Service and applied for political asylum.
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Appearing before the INS with a relative and having the relative translate his French into English, Tshilonda gave an overview of his situation. In particular, he did not detail his prison torture. He says he was too ashamed.
While there are about 900,000 legal immigrants to the United States each year, there are another 12,000 or so who are granted asylum from an applicant pool of about 50,000.
An asylum officer heard, and spurned, Tshilonda. His claims were largely oral. Supporting evidence was skimpy. A deportation proceeding was triggered, with his fate seemingly in the hands of an immigration judge.
Up to this point, his experience was typical. For a host of cultural and practical reasons, many asylum seekers are rebuffed.
They may be filled with anxiety and fear and sound unpersuasive. They miss filing deadlines. They may not have the $3,000 or more to get a real lawyer. Even many wealthy asylum seekers are forced to flee their native lands without a dime.
Though spurned by the asylum officer, Tshilonda got lucky. A human rights organization steered him to Georgetown’s immigration clinic. There, 12 students gain credits each semester by pairing up and working for free on behalf of six clinic clients. Tshilonda got Mosser and Francis.
Under scrutiny of a professor, Philip Schrag, they proceeded to interview Tshilonda at length. They started investigating his claims. Since they weren’t going to trek to Zaire, it meant a load of phone calls to Africa to seek corroboration.
They began to find such evidence, mostly via people who knew him well and could confirm his allegations of harassment and torture.
Meanwhile, the students tried to figure out a way to prove he had been poisoned. They contacted a forensic toxicologist at the FBI, but were told there was no empirical way to confirm the poisoning so long after. (A cynic might wonder why the FBI lab, given recent disclosures, couldn’t claim to confirm anything.)
Ultimately, the students got an affidavit from a Washington doctor who said he found symptoms consistent with a 1995 poisoning, as well as confirming Tshilonda’s scars of physical abuse.
“We began getting great statements from people in Zaire. Other people said they saw him after he was poisoned and how he’d been sick for two months,” said Mosser, who estimates he and Francis labored 35 hours a week on the matter.
“At the same time, we did research to show that these sorts of incidents were common in Zaire, how political activists are often arrested, attacked and beaten. To meet our legal burden, we had to show all that.”
They had to prove their client had a well-founded fear of persecution if forced to return. They operated under the belief they had a deadline of April 4, a Friday. As the deadline approached, they were still without a raft of affidavits from Zaire that they needed.
On the night of April 3, the affidavits arrived. The students labored mightily, only to find out in the morning they could file their papers the following Monday. Relieved, they assembled a case for Tshilonda nearly 3 inches thick.
They tried to contact the government attorney who had handled the deportation case, but she was involved in another trial. When they reached her, she was too busy to talk.
Finally, Francis induced her on April 11 to discuss Tshilonda’s upcoming trial.
“She made clear that setting up an appointment to discuss a trial was unnecessary,” Mosser said. “The government was willing to stipulate to our entire claim of asylum.”
“I was ecstatic and surprised,” Francis said. “But I tried to contain my enthusiasm, to show her we expected that result.”
“I hold the Georgetown students in high regard,” said George Maugans, chief lawyer for the INS’ Baltimore-based district, which handled the case. “We have no problem stipulating if the case is strong.”
On April 15, they appeared before a judge in Baltimore with a summary of the evidence. It included the just-publicized news that Mobutu had appointed a new prime minister, namely the brother-in-law of the same guy who had overseen the torture of Tshilonda in 1995.
The judge approved the agreement with the government. Tshilonda had his asylum, joining a very small group whose request is essentially granted in such a fashion.
“When they told me, I was happy. But to say `very, very happy’ is not quite right,” said Tshilonda, who is living with a cousin in Maryland and is unemployed.
“I still have my wife and three kids back there. This is not the solution to my problem.”
Neither may the likely ascension to power in Zaire of rebel leader Laurent Kabila.
Tshilonda finds reasons to be suspicious of Kabila, including his treatment of refugees from neighboring Rwanda. He’s far from convinced that life will change for the better.
“For now,” said the political exile, “let’s wait.”
Cokie watch (Part 1)
ABC’s Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts will be speaking May 20 before the Broadcast Advertising Club of Chicago. In an act of true charity, it’s a freebie (the club doesn’t pay for speakers).
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It’s $35 a head at the Hyatt Regency Chicago.
Cokie watch (Part 2).
The Harry Walker Agency, which books speaking gigs for Cokie Roberts and other luminaries, is sending out a flier with word of new clients, surely happy to speak to your group for a fat, five-figure fee:
– Benazir Bhutto, who was bounced as prime minister of Pakistan amid allegations of corruption.
– Boutros Boutros-Ghali, bounced as secretary general of the United Nations amid claims of administrative ineptitude and a lack of vision.
– John Deutch, bounced as head of the Central Intelligence Agency after proving too candid and prickly for President Clinton’s liking.
– William Bratton, who resigned unceremoniously as New York City police commissioner amid a feud with Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.
At least Cokie has kept her day job.