[Red Moon]

Makosi wins battle to stay in UK

Zimbabwean Big Brother star Makosi Musambasi has won her battle to stay in the UK as a refugee.

The ruling was made by the central London asylum and immigration tribunal on Thursday.

The 25-year-old had her working visa curtailed and faced deportation after she left her job as a cardiac nurse to appear on the C4 reality show.

Ms Musambasi, of High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, came third in the show behind Anthony Hutton and Eugene Sully.

The Home Office gave the former nurse notice to quit the UK in August since she was allowed to stay only as long as she worked as a nurse.

On learning of her imminent deportation, Ms Musambasi, who came to Britain in 1998, made an asylum application which was rejected earlier this month.

Violent confrontation

However, the tribunal ruled that she could face violent confrontation if she returns to her native Zimbabwe, following her lewd behaviour on Big Brother earlier this summer.

Ms Musambasi told the tribunal that she feared for her life should she be forced to return to Zimbabwe, where she claimed she would be "looked at like I have violated a lot of cultural rights just by wearing a bikini".

"It would not be safe for me to return at the moment," she told the hearing.

"The police know who I am now. They know I am scared to return because of documents put in the newspapers."

"She is in a different situation now than she was some seven months ago before appearing on Big Brother," said tribunal chairman Francis Pinkerton.

No problems

"Before that she had been to Zimbabwe on a number of occasions and presumably encountered no problems."

"The appearance on the show has changed things a great deal."

"Her evidence is that she now does fear to go back to Zimbabwe."

"She is therefore a failed asylum seeker and we find that because she is an involuntary returnee, she is a refugee under the 1951 convention and therefore we allow her appeal on that basis."

As a refugee, Makosi can now stay in Britain for five years.

The Home Office said it was "disappointed" by the ruling and may appeal.

Source: The BBC