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About 40 people gathered on the outskirts of Villawood
detention centre for a nighttime vigil on October 26 to commemorate the death
of a Tamil refugee detainee who had taken his own life that morning.
The gathering included refugee activists, members of the
Tamil community and friends of Daya Jayasakara, or “Shooty,” as he was known.
Shooty had been in detention for two years after arriving in Australia by boat
seeking asylum. He had been granted refugee status several months earlier and
was waiting for ASIO security clearance.
During the vigil we received reports that Serco was
preventing detainees inside the centre from accessing areas where they could
view the gathering, a tactic the corporation has used during past protests at
the site.
Participants consistently spoke about Shooty as being a
very jovial person, some expressing shock and confusion at the fact that such a
happy man would commit suicide. A Tamil man recounted how Shooty took it upon
himself to keep up morale when the boat that he and other asylum seekers were
travelling on became disabled and they were left without food and water for 10
days.
Others raised the policy of mandatory detention, saying
that such tragedies would not occur if asylum seekers were treated with
dignity. Nick Riemer, of Refugee Action Coalition, spoke of the callous
attitude of government minister Chris Bowen, “whose response to the death was
to say he [Shooty] was probably a security risk”.
Riemer also spoke against opposition leader Tony Abbott’s remark that we should not “draw too many policy outcomes from what is an individual tragedy,” asking “how many individual tragedies must occur before the government changes its policy?”
The crowd also heard from Ramees, a Tamil detainee in
Villawood, who described the depressed atmosphere in the centre and his own
trauma, saying that he takes three sleeping pills every night and suffers from
bad dreams.
Lingaruban, a Tamil refugee who had been released from
detention the same day, explained how the centre lacked adequate mental health
care and that detainees were simply given pills if they were suffering mental
problems.
Lingaruban also mentioned Shooty’s wish that, even in
death, he would not want to return to Sri Lanka. Fellow detainess in Villawood
are asking permission for Shooty’s body to be taken to the centre for a short
Hindu ceremony, which is currently being denied. Supporters are also seeking
the possibility of Shooty’s next of kin being allowed to Australia for the
funeral. (GreenLeft Weekly)
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