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Sam and Shaho were neighbours in Hallabja, in the Kurdish area of Iraq. Both escaped brutal oppression to build a new life in the UK. While Shaho's body bears the evidence of his former life, he has been granted indefinite leave to remain by the Home Office and now lives in London, dividing his time between his many friends and admirers and training for wheelchair marathons and half-marathons. Sam, however, is abled bodied but crucially disabled by the Home Office's refusal to grant him this indefinite leave to remain. Unable to return home, he has been allowed to string along in Colchester for the last 5 years, leading a life desperately devoid of any goals or hope.
I hope that through this film people are able to relate to some of the issues that Asylum Seekers face. They are human beings, but sometimes our institutions and indeed our society treat them purely as numbers.
Produced and Directed by Ben Cocker and Rafek Fatah, 2005
Special Thanks to Saman Faraj and Shaho Qadir
32Mb|13mins|50kb/s