I feel really really terrible.
Really terrible.
I just don't know what to do.
What do you do when you're 81 with
cancer and told you can't return to the
UK, a country you've called home for
over six decades?
>> Hannah Dana finds herself in that very
situation with her daughter Akia.
>> Okay.
After what was meant to be a two week
family holiday in Kumarsi, Ghana,
a city that's nearly 200 miles away from
the capital Acra in the south of the
country and over 4,000 miles away from
where she usually lives in North London.
Almost 4 months ago, they turned up to
the airport to go home and was sent
away.
>> We were shocked. mom has traveled uh
from the UK to Ghana and back to the UK
with the same documents that we've had
we had with us um for over 40 years.
There's not been a problem ever. Um and
so when we were told she couldn't travel
back, we were devastated. Hannah Danqua
is a UK citizen. She was born here in
Kamasi in 1944, which was a British
colony at the time.
But now she and her daughter have been
stuck in a hotel room for four months
because of a discrepancy in her
documentation. One that a legal document
explains and has never stopped her
traveling until now. And her family are
desperately trying to get her home.
>> My poor daughter have to take me out in
the wheelchair sometimes. I have two
knee operations. When I walk too much,
it hurts. And I feel for my daughter.
They've tried everything they can think
of and even the NHS wrote a letter to
the home office confirming Hannah's
chemo treatment that she should be
closely monitored and needs to be back
in the UK as soon as possible. We're
left in limbo um not knowing what's
happening next. Um
we just know nothing. We just go week by
week.
>> Back in London, I met up with Hannah's
other daughter, Anna. They're supported
by the charity Justice for Wind Rush and
have been pleading with officials to
fasttrack a new British passport.
>> It's a job in itself chasing all of
these different departments. We've
called the passport office nearly every
day. The foreign office we call
regularly. We're in contact with various
different people in the same departments
and it's what is most frustrating. It's
as though they all don't have access to
the same information because we're
having to repeat ourselves over and over
again. It's frustrating. And it's
infuriating and it's shocking that
departments with such important jobs um
can kind of make some of the the
missteps that they've made with us in
our situation.
>> The home office would say, "Look, we
need to make all of these checks before
we give out a British passport."
>> Of course, and they do. But someone
who's got 60 years of life in the UK, I
think that there should be someone who
should have looked at this and say,
"There's a British pensioner who's
stranded abroad. Let's carry this
through the system. Let's continue this
quickly." Belro Adi is an MP of Garnetan
descent who has come across a lot of
these cases.
>> I think the issue is with the home
office itself. You know, the culture
still maintains one of a slightly
hostile environment. There's also a lot
of confusion about the Windrush scandal.
We have to remember that the Windrush
scandal covered all people from all
Commonwealth countries. Sometimes when
they see a case like this coming from a
country like Ghana, um you you don't
have a situation where it's looked at in
the same way. Windrush Square, where
Hannah's case sits alongside the many of
Commonwealth citizens who found
themselves in this situation where they
no longer have the right to be in the
UK. I've covered stories like this for
many years. And immigration lawyers tell
me that most people either fight like
hell, they say, or give up.
This is Hannah Dangqua's life in the UK
as a young mom in the 70s and 80s in
Trafalga Square. She had five children
here and used to work at the council, a
life she's keen to return to.
and I want to get back to UK.
Whatever they want to me to do
to get the papers right,
I will do it.
>> For now, her life in the UK is on hold
and no one knows how long for.
Well, in the last hour, the Home Office
sent us a statement saying while they do
not comment on individual passport
applications, a passport is only issued
once all checks are satisfactory
completed. We also contacted the Wind
Rush commissioner. They did not respond.