Suaad Hagi Mohamud, centre, her ex-husband Hussein Asbscir, bottom left, and their 12-year-old son Mohamed Hussein, right, are surrounded by friends, family, and journalists upon Mohamud's arrival at Pearson International Airport in Toronto on Saturday, August 15, 2009. (Darren Calabrese / THE CANADIAN PRESS)
CTV — A woman who was reunited with her son in Toronto after being held in Kenya for three months was undergoing tests for a respiratory illness Sunday, as Ottawa launched a probe into how she became marooned in the African country.
Suaad Hagi Mohamud has been suffering from breathing problems since June, when she was imprisoned for eight days in Nairobi’s Langata Women’s Prison, according to her lawyer.
“What we know is it’s a respiratory illness (but) there are a lot of possibilities,” lawyer Raoul Boulakia told CTV News reporter Chris Eby on Sunday, adding that the ailment could be pneumonia or a tropical infection.
Mohamud, a 31-year-old Canadian citizen from Toronto, landed at Pearson airport on Saturday afternoon to cheers and singing from about 20 supporters and family members.
“You can’t imagine, I’m really happy to come back, I’m really, really happy to come home,” Mohamud said. “I’m glad my whole nightmare is over.”
She had been unable to leave Kenya after visiting her mother, because local authorities said she didn’t resemble her four-year-old passport photo.
Mohamud produced several other forms of identification to prove her identity, including her Ontario driver’s licence, her health card, social insurance card and a Canadian citizenship certificate. She even produced a receipt from a Toronto drycleaner and her Shoppers Drug Mart “Optimum” card.
But the Canadian High Commission in Nairobi said she was indeed an impostor and voided her Canadian passport.
Abdi Warsame, a family friend of Suaad Hagi Mohamud, told CTV Toronto on Aug. 16, 2009 that he could tell the woman was not feeling well when she stepped off the plane.
Mohamud was scheduled to stand trial in Nairobi on charges of identity theft. However, a DNA test eventually proved she was the woman in her passport photo, by matching results from her genetic test with those of her 12-year-old son in Toronto.
“They doubted that she was a Canadian citizen. The government didn’t step up to the plate,” Abdi Warsame, a spokeperson for the Mohamud family, told CTV News Channel on Sunday.
Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan said Sunday the Canadian Border Services Agency is working on a report detailing how Mohamud came to be detained in Kenya.
He will wait to read the agency’s report before deciding whether to award Mohamud compensation for her ordeal, he said.
Meanwhile, Mohamud’s Kenyan lawyer said his client will sue Kenya, Canada and Dutch airline KLM for damages.
But Boulakia said it’s too soon to say whether a lawsuit will be filed in a Canadian court.
Ironically, the CBSA probe is preventing Boulakia from beginning his own investigations into the ordeal — a delay which is unacceptable, he said.
“How can the government not feel ashamed that it hasn’t released all the records to me?” he said.
Meanwhile, the Canadian Somali Congress said it would like the federal government to be more proactive in dealing with Kenyan officials in such cases.
“This problem is beyond Suaad Mohamud. This happens to a lot of other people,” said Ahmed Hussen, president of the congress. “We suspect that they rushed to judgment, that they prejudged this person.”
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