Portsmouth man sues government to get passport renewed

By Tim McGlone

The Virginian-Pilot

NORFOLK

At the height of the 1998 coup in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, U.S. officials rushed 17-year-old Billy Ekofo out of the country.

The officials handed him $551 and had him sign a bunch of papers he could not read. A week later, he landed in Virginia to live with people he did not know in Newport News.

Ekofo, who was born in Indiana while his parents lived there temporarily, is the only U.S. citizen in his family. In the Congo, he left behind his father, mother and three siblings.

Now married with a son and living in Portsmouth, Ekofo tried to renew his passport but was rejected because he never repaid the government the $551, which has now swelled, with interest and fees, to more than $7,000. After a slew of letters and phone calls pleading for a waiver, he's now been forced to sue the government.

In the late summer of 1998, as rebel forces surrounded the Congo capital of Kinshasa, Ekofo could hear gunfire in the distance. The U.S. government, which had an embassy there, ordered all American citizens to evacuate.

Ekofo remembers Aug. 13 clearly. It was his father's birthday. He had just done laundry, and it was hanging to dry outside. When the officials came for him, he had only a few articles to pack and little time to do it.

His father went with him to the airport. Had he been 16 or younger, one of his parents could have traveled with him, but he had turned 17 earlier that year.

The U.S. officials handed him a document to sign. It was titled "Receipt and Promise to Repay Funds Provided for Subsistence/Repatriation." He did not understand a word of it, and no one at the time explained it to him in his native French.

He had a passport, a plane ticket and $551 to get him to Newport News. The trip took a week, as he hopscotched from the Congo to Cameroon to Brussels, and then to Paris, to New York and eventually to Richmond.

Ekofo remembered nothing of his earlier time in the United States. His father, a Congo national, attended a seminary in Indianapolis in the early 1980s. His pregnant wife joined him, giving birth to Billy in January 1981. He was the only one of their four children born here, making him an automatic citizen.

They stayed about a year, then lived in Paris for about five years and returned to Kinshasa, where his father began his ministry and taught at the local university. Ekofo's life there centered on school and church.

"I thought in my mind my future was already laid out," he said.

When Ekofo landed in Richmond, he had 37 cents left. He called a number his father had given him and waited to be picked up. He lived in Newport News with a family friend, but they did not have room for him. The friend persuaded his co-worker, Becky Kiser, to take Ekofo into her Norfolk home.

"He was really disoriented when he arrived," Kiser said.

Ekofo spoke little of his home in the Congo but clearly missed his family, she said. He enrolled at Maury High School but had to take night classes to catch up on his studies and learn English.

"That first day at Maury, I was lost," he said. "The only class I really knew was French." Maury was a culture shock. He thought he would fit in with the black students, but they teased him for his accent and not knowing rap music or American sports.

So he immersed himself in his studies. His English came along quickly, and after two years there he was able to obtain an academic scholarship to Hampden-Sydney College.

Maury French teacher Mohsin Bouziane recalled Ekofo as highly driven.

"He had this energy and enthusiasm. He was so dedicated," Bouziane said. "He was one of the students I will always remember."

Ekofo recalled receiving one or two letters about the loan, while still in high school and living with the Kiser family. Kiser said she vaguely recalled one letter but did not understand it and must have simply dismissed it. They never heard from the State Department again, they said.

Ekofo obtained an academic scholarship and student loans for college and even studied abroad on his then-valid passport, first in France in 2002 and then in England in 2004. No one ever stopped him at the port of entry to question him about his passport. He didn't realize until later that his passport was stamped "restricted" and he was not supposed to leave the country.

"It's not like I'm trying to hide," he said.

He returned to Norfolk after graduation and took a job at Regent University working with foreign exchange students. He enrolled in a graduate program and is currently working on a degree in film production.

He also returned to the church the Kiser family took him to, the First Presbyterian Church on Colonial Avenue.

It was there, during a singles meet-and-greet, that he met his future wife, Karen Daily.

When she saw him, she tells people, "It was like the heavens parted and the angels sang."

Ekofo reserved his emotions, saying only that initially he was "intrigued" by the young brunette. She wanted him to ask her out, but he was nervous. He asked Kiser what to do.

" 'Mom, I have a problem,' " Kiser remembered him asking.

He did finally ask her out. Their first date was at a coffee shop.

They married in October 2006. Earlier this year, Daily and Ekofo decided to take a Caribbean cruise, a long-needed vacation to celebrate the first birthday of their son. They used their tax refund to pay for the trip, which, they point out, the government could have taken to pay off part of the debt.

Because the ship they would be taking would be stopping in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, they thought they should bring their passports.

Ekofo sent his off to be renewed and got a call from a Louisiana office with the news: They could not renew the passport until the debt was paid. He explained, " I didn't understand it was going to be a loan. " His wife, a lawyer, tried arguing for the loan to be forgiven. She was told the government could not do that. Turns out they didn't need the passports for the cruise.

When they returned, they consulted with Norfolk attorney O.L. "Buzz" Gilbert, who had once helped a young Somali girl get a green card. Gilbert said he wrote letters to the State Department, Virginia's two senators, several congressmen and the president.

Getting no help there, Gilbert filed a federal lawsuit on Sept. 11. He's arguing that the government's six-year statute of limitations to repay such loans has long expired.

The government has not yet responded. State Department spokesman Andy Laine said he could not comment on individual cases but confirmed that the department has had a long-standing policy to seek repayment of repatriation loans.

"If they do not repay the money, the person can't receive a new U.S. passport," Laine said.

For Ekofo, as the years passed, he has worried about his family back home. They keep in touch by e-mail and an occasional phone call, but the constant political unrest in the Congo has only added to his concerns. He met his father once, in Washington, a few years ago for a short visit. He doesn't know how or when he'll see his family again.

"My biggest fear is if something were to happen to my family in Kinshasa there would be no way to get there," he said.

"I just want my passport."

Tim McGlone, (757) 446-2343, tim.mcglone@pilotonline.com