The Case Of Mr Peter Qasim Poem by Francis Duggan

He has spent the last six years in an Australian detention centre even though he's not seen as a refugee
By the U N H C R or the Australian Government a Government that lacks in common decency
He fled his Homeland Kashmir in fear of persecution and he knows about man's inhumanity
The time is ripe for John Howard and Amanda Vanstone to issue the orders to set Mr Peter Qasim free

Of the hell hole known as Baxter detention centre where they hold people who are not guilty of crime
Poor refugees and other Stateless people born in the wrong place and there at the wrong time
To flee persecution should not be an offence that the Australian Government other Governments human rights record fail to criticize
Is because on human rights they too have a bad record and their silence on the matter no surprise

In Australian Immigration detention centres only innocent people who cannot go back to their home Country
Due to their religion or their cultural difference condemned by their circumstance of birth and their poverty
Australia's Prime Minister is a mean spirited fellow and in every way you look at him he's small
The cheek of him to talk about his fairness and about his sense of a fair go for all

When people like Mr Peter Qasim are in a detention centre because he doesn't have a passport to show
The Indian Government they do not want him back without I D him they don't wish to know
And the Australian Government won't free him to live free in Australia so in Baxter detention centre he remain
A thirty year old his best days are behind him and will he ever live as a free man again?