Autistic Sydney girl Emeline Yuwono, 11, risks deportation

EMELINE and her mother have been abandoned by their families because of the 11-year-old’s autism. Now they risk being deported from Australia too.

Randwick resident Damien Hill is trying to lobbying local MP to stop Mei Tieng Lim and her autistic duaghter Emeline Yuwono from being deported back to Indonesian

AN 11-year-old Sydney girl with a mental disability is at risk of being deported, facing homelessness and being deprived of schooling and medical treatment, unless Immigration Minister Peter Dutton steps in.

Where Emeline Yuwono came from, they thought she was possessed by the devil.

As a little girl in Indonesia she began to show signs of difficulty that other kids didn’t face and wasn’t developing at the rate her parents’ expected her to.

The condition that plagued the otherwise happy young girl was autism, but her father and extended family, basically everyone in her life excluding her mother Mei Lim, wouldn’t accept it.

She was taken to a Buddhist temple for “cleansing”, which a family friend describes as “very scary” and “like torture”, but when the spirits her family believed had possessed her remained (in their view), they simply abandoned the little girl and her mother.

Having been left without support from any family Mei was forced to put Emeline in an orphanage as she worked selling rice.

When she went to collect her daughter she would find her “covered in lice”, scabies infecting her skin.

“Once I went there and I found out she had to eat leftover food from the dog,” she tells news.com.au

“I feel so sad. I feel so sorry that my daughter was like this and eating rubbish from a dog. I can’t even believe it. I had to work and use all my savings for her. I had no choice.”

Mei knew she had to make a change and took a chance using all her savings to take her daughter to Australia, but now she could face deportation.

When the pair arrived three years ago on a holiday visa, Mei’s application for a protection visa was rejected and since then a battle with immigration to allow Emeline to stay has consumed the family.

After already having lost her family and her mother giving up everything to provide for her, unless Immigration Minister Peter Dutton intervenes and grants Emeline protection, she could have to give up her life in Australia too.

Mei Tieng Lim and her autistic daughter Emeline Yuwono with supporter, Damien Hill.

Mei knew she was breaking the law when she brought her daughter to Sydney, but the desperate mother felt she didn’t have a choice.

“I tried to bring my daughter to Canada but they rejected me, after praying and praying and being rejected again I decided to go,” she says.

“I knew Australia was strict but I also knew she would have a better life there. I knew it would be breaking the law (to overstay) but I didn’t have a choice.”

Mei sold everything to bring her daughter to Sydney and with support from the women’s refuge she has been living in and the immigration lawyers whose attention she caught, she’s been able to establish a good life for Emeline.

Christina Wong got to know Mei and Emeline through her work with Wesley Mission when they first arrived.

“I really felt sorry for them,” she says.

“When I first met Emeline she was very unsettled. She could not sit still. She was constantly tearing paper and sometimes she was so unsettled that we needed to have someone hold her down and she would become violent.”

Three years on Emeline is doing much better thanks to the support she and Mei have had.

Ms Wong realised the difference growing up a supportive environment would make to Emeline and Mei, and knowing what they’d been through in Indonesia, felt compelled to start a public petition, via change.org, demanding Immigration Minister Peter Dutton not send them back to Indonesia.

“If they have to go back, they will face homelessness, she’ll probably have to go back into an orphanage, discrimination and will be denied medical care, education, those basic things that she needs and that she can have here,” she says.

“Mei came here because she heard Australia is a very humane place and heard so many good things. When she got here she thought there might be someone who cares, and that’s why she took the leap of faith in the first place.”

Emeline’s case is in the hands of Peter Dutton, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection.

With close to 25,000 signatories to the petition, and support from some politicians, Emeline’s future is looking a little more promising but there are no guarantees.

Though Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull wrote to Mr Dutton in his capacity as Member for Wentworth, where Mei and Emeline live, he is yet to reiterate his support in his new job.

A spokeswoman from Mr Dutton’s office told news.com.au: “There is an active request for intervention on behalf of Ms Lim and her daughter and they will remain in Australia pending a final decision on their request.”

Ms Wong told news.com.au Mei and Emeline’s case highlight the difficulties for people in need who can be helped in Australia, but have no official channels to go through.

Mei overstayed her visitor’s visa, hoping to be given a second chance by the government when she got here. She knew it wasn’t the proper way to do things, but for her, there was no official process.

“There is no proper way that she could come. There is no proper way for her to go anywhere,” she said.

“If people put themselves in her shoes and had that child, I mean, who wouldn’t do that?”

Originally published as Autistic Sydney girl Emeline Yuwono, 11, risks deportation