David Bariu’s story is tragic, reliving his struggles of deportation from US where he served in the military for almost a decade back to Kenya.
He was speaking in an interview with an international media outlet on Wednesday July 24, where he recounted the events leading to his deportation, stating that he was a victim of fraud by a rogue recruiter.
Bairu shared that he left Kenya for the US on a student visa in 1998, after which he was recruited to join the US army and the then Air Force Reserve.
During the enlistment process, Bariu was promised US citizenship and various other benefits by his recruiter. He soon discovered that he was among several other Africans who had traveled to the US to join the army under the same assurances.
“I was born in Nairobi, Kenya. I came here to further my education,” he told the publication.
In 2001 after he has served for three years, his recruiter was flagged for unscrupulous dealings in their enlisting, and he was court marshalled and found guilty of fraudelently recruiting international students into the US army.
This marked the onset of his troubles, as he and other recruits were accused of being in the country illegally by the immigration court.
Bairu dismissed the claims as he was oblivious of his recruiter’s devious plans to get him and other Africans to fill his recruitment quota for a lumpsum amount from the army.
“My recruiter was fraudulently recruiting internationals to meet his quota to meet his margins,” Bariu remarked.
The discovery resulted in Bariu’s deportation from the US along with other recruits. His military certifications and documentation were also revoked.
Before his deportation came into effect, he spent a year attempting to appeal the decision at the Texas Detention Centre which proved futile as he eventually returned to Kenya in 2007.
“It’s difficult to explain what reasoning they used to justify my deportation. It didn’t make sense, I was young. I did not know if they were trying to make me give up.
I don’t if they were trying to radicalise me and make me fight the system or say bad things about the United States,” he added.
He remained in Kenya until 2022 before traveling to the US again through the Immigrant Military Member Veterans Initiative program.
Bariu during his stint at the new job discovered that his situation mirrored that of other US veterans who were unceremoniously deported and hence took the opportunity to urge the US government to repatriate the expelled army men.
