Asylum seeker Gerard Santos will celebrate Christmas in freedom but with the prospect of deportation hanging over him.

The qualified doctor has lawfully lived and worked in Britain since 1992 but was detained earlier this year.

He was hours from being deported to West Africa when the Home Office granted him a last-minute reprieve.

The 39-year-old was sent to a detention centre before being moved to a high-security prison in Rochester where he was incarcerated for 28 days.

He was released on bail at the end of July and is now back with partner Sheila Archibald in Rustington.

He has returned to his job at the residential home where he works with adults with learning difficulties.

But the threat of an enforced return to Benin is still hanging over him.

He is due to learn his immediate fate in early February when his bail comes up for renewal.

Meanwhile, he must arrange his life and work around the requirement to sign in at a local police station three times a week.

He said: "It would be nice to have the frequency of that reduced. I've no intention of absconding. If I'd wanted to, I would have done it years ago.

"But it's still better than what I've been through and at least I'm free at the minute.

"We just have to wait and see what happens. At the back of your mind you do think, could it be your last Christmas?

"We are just hoping that from all the evidence we have put forward, the background to my case and the contribution I've made to the community over the years, that maybe after ten years there will be a positive end to it.

"I'm optimistic by nature but it's out of my hands.

"In all my correspondence with the Home Office I have been dealing with a different person each time. There has been no one case officer to refer back to. I'm hoping and praying that when an independent panel looks at all the evidence they will look at it in a different light."

Mr Santos said he could not have got through his prison ordeal without the overwhelming support of friends, acquaintances and even strangers.

He said: "The whole thing was so sudden after nine-and-a-half years."