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Edmonton’s Yussuf Madey Mahamed was scheduled to be deported Monday at 5 p.m. to Kenya, and believed Sunday was the last night he’d ever spend with his family. On Monday morning, the father of four learned that he is permitted to stay in Canada while his application is processed.

“I cried and I never thought that kind of tears could come out from me,” Yussuf Madey Mahamed said through an interpreter Monday. “(Tears were) all over my shirt … Even if I tried to describe it, I couldn’t believe what I felt.”

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Canada Border Services Agency officials earlier ordered Mahamed deported, and he was unsuccessful in an appeal hearing Friday. He made a desperate public plea Saturday for more time to have his application to stay in Canada processed.

In a phone call Monday morning, a representative for Edmonton-Mill Woods Liberal MP and federal Infrastructure and Communities Minister Amarjeet Sohi told Ahmed Abdulkadir, executive director of Ogaden Somali Community of Alberta Residents, that Mahamed was permitted to stay in Canada while his application is processed.

Originally from Somalia, Mahamed fled war and lived in Kenya’s Ifo refugee camp for almost 20 years. He entered Canada in 2013 using a forged Kenyan passport under the name Farah Muhamed Aballahi.

Mahamed is married to Canadian citizen Halima Ibrahim Ali. They have three young children together and care for a fourth daughter from Ali’s previous relationship.