According to the BBC, Shardey had for many years assumed he
was officially British after he first arrived in the UK in 1977 to study
accountancy on a student visa that also allowed him to work.
The Ghanaian took on a series of jobs and said no one ever
queried his right to live or work in the UK.
The report added that he married a British woman and moved
to Wallasey to run his own business — a newsagent called Nelson’s News.
When his marriage to a Briton ended, he married another
British woman and they had two sons — Jacob and Aaron.
Shardey said he never left the UK, as he saw no need to, and
regarded the country as his home.
“Nobody questioned me. I bought all my things on credit,
even the house,” BBC quoted the retired newsagent as saying.
“I got a mortgage. And nobody questioned me about anything.”
The 74-year-old has performed jury service. In 2007, he was
given a police award for bravery after tackling a robber who was attacking a
delivery man with a baseball bat.
Shardey said he was confronted with a rude shock in 2019
when he applied for a passport so he could go back to Ghana following the death
of his mother. It was then the Home Office told him he had no right to be in
the UK in the first place.
Authorities told him to apply for the 10-year route to
settlement which costs about £7,000, with a further £10,500 over the same
period, to access the national health scheme.
“I cannot afford to pay any part of the money they are
asking,” said Shardey, who is recovering from prostate cancer.
“Telling me to go through that route is a punishment, and
it’s not fair in any way.
“I don’t understand why this fuss at all, because I put my
life, my whole self into this country.”
The order means Shardey will not be allowed to stay in the
UK permanently until he is 84.
Nicola Burgess, a lawyer at Greater Manchester Immigration
Aid Unit (GMIAU), is now taking the Home Office to court on Shardey’s behalf.
BBC said the Home Office declined to comment on the case.
