The
statement by the British Home Office on Monday that it would henceforth
demand a 3,000-pound (N750,000) refundable bond for visas for
“high-risk” visitors from six former colonies in Africa and Asia finally
put an end to several weeks of speculations and animated discussions
over the issue. The Home Office statement said the visa bond “is the
next step in making sure our immigration system is more selective,
bringing down net migration from the hundreds of thousands to the tens
of thousands while still welcoming the brightest and the best to
Britain. The pilot will apply to visitor visas, but if the scheme is
successful, we’d like to be able to apply it on an intelligence-led
basis on any visa route and any country,’’ sparking immediate and
widespread condemnations across the globe.The Home Office’s hope that
the bond system “deters overstaying of visas and recovers costs of
foreign nationals using public services like hospitals and schools,’’ is
understood in the context of the fact that immigration was a key issue
in Cameron’s election campaign for his Conservative Party, and he has
even has pledged to cut net immigration from 252,000 a year in 2010 to
100,000 a year by 2015. As statistics from the Home Office indicate, citizens of Nigeria, Ghana, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, the countries targeted by the new policy, applied for more than 500,000 visas to Britain last year alone. When the proposal was first mulled in June, it was trailed by condemnations, and the Federal Government wasted no time in calling on the British government to renounce the proposal. Foreign Affairs Minister, Ambassador Olugbenga Ashiru, called on the British High Commissioner in Nigeria, Andrew Pocock, to express “the strong displeasure of the government and people of Nigeria” with the discriminatory policy.
Ashiru warned that the plan would definitely defeat the two country’s commitment to double trade by 2014. Indeed, figures from Nigeria’s Ministry of Trade and Commerce showed that trade between the two countries increased nearly five-fold from $2.35 billion in 2010 to $11.57 billion last year, with the value of Nigerian imports of British goods doubling at the time. Thus, government officials, the National Assembly and the civil society, many of whom considered the policy discriminatory, even insulting and a departure from the family spirit which had hitherto prevailed in the Commonwealth of nations, descended severely on the British government.
Appalled by the criticisms that trailed the proposed plan in the country, Pocock hastily issued a press statement, insisting that “The vast majority (of Nigerians) would not be required to pay a bond.” He added for good measure that more than 180,000 Nigerians applied to visit Britain each year and about around 126,000 applications, representing 70 per cent, were successful , adding that the 3,000 pounds figure was a mere speculation and did not reflect the actual proposition.
All of that is now history, as the new policy has created marked divisions in the UK. Vince Cable, a member of the Liberal Democrats, told The Financial Times: “It is very disappointing and it has not been agreed across the coalition and it seems to send the wrong message that Britain is closed for business. The operation for the visa scheme, together with the bonds on these Commonwealth countries is simply having the effect of driving bona fide visitors who want to spend and to do business in the UK to France and Germany.” But Coalition partners’ Lib Dems backed the scheme as an extra route for people who have been rejected for visas, saying that It was never meant to apply to everyone.’’
On the foreign scene, protests have been mounting. While Khaled Mahmud, owner of a Bangladeshi travel agency in Dhaka that deals with British student visas, posited that the policy “smacks of a deep-rooted racial attitude,” a leading Karachi, Pakistan-based computer businessman Syed Shahid Ali said the “painful and unbearable” new policy would have a negative impact on British tourism and business. Haider Abbas Rizvi, a former Pakistani lawmaker, called for a review of the decision because, in his view, “There are just a few people who deviate from the system or break the law, so instead of bringing common travellers and law-abiding people under the possible financial burden, there should be strict surveillance on the violators of law in the U.K. or elsewhere,” Rizvi told the Associated Press.
Reactions in Nigeria have not been less strident. Speaking with the Nigerian Tribune on Tuesday, a retired Professor of Economics at the University of Ibadan, Professor L.O Oyemakinde, stated that “the imposition of the visa bond is most unfortunate, as it will create hardship for many Nigerians intending to travel to Britain.’’ He however warned that diplomatic measures remained the most effective panacea to the policy. His words: “Painful as it is, we can do very little about it. Crying will not help us; the issue should be resolved diplomatically. Three thousand pounds sterling is a lot of money and it has nothing to do with the normal expenditure that would still be incurred by every traveller. Indeed, coming at a time of economic recession, it is most unfortunate.’’
Chair of the House of Representatives Committee on Diaspora Affairs, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, had, while reacting to the proposal last month, urged that the “Nigerian Government should apply the principle of reciprocity by asking their citizens coming to Nigeria to pay N5 million. This type of thing happened before when the South African government said Nigerians travelling to South Africa should pay a deportation fee of N100,000. When the Nigerian government applied the principle of reciprocity, South Africa stopped this discriminatory fee.’’ Indeed, the Campaign for Democracy (CD) President, Dr Joe Okei-Odumakin, went as far as calling on the Federal Government to review its relationship with the UK. She was highly uncompromising: “The Federal Government should go after the British interest in the country. This bond decision is quite unfair, and I believe Nigeria should review its relationship with Britain.”
As observed by many analysts, Britain’s right to regulate the flow of immigrants in the light of its national security objectives, particularly given the threat posed by terrorism, is inalienable. However, the fact that the proposal came after the threat by Britain to sanction Nigeria on an anti-homosexuality bill passed by the National Assembly heightened the tension in the country, forcing many to conclude that it would create cracks in its relationship with the British government.
Again, many argued that Nigeria’s inclusion on the list of the six countries affected by the visa bond policy was baseless, since there are thousands of law-abiding Nigerian professionals and university students in Britain. They argued that the anti-terrorist war must be anchored on better foundations than a visa bond policy, as such policy would not deter terrorists who are widely believed to enjoy heavy funding through an international criminal network. Indeed, the argument was advanced that if, as the British government clarified in the wake of the controversy, the visa bond was to affect only individuals considered ‘high-risk’, why grant them a visa at all?
However, according to another school of thought, the British “insult’’ was well deserved since the desperation by Nigerians to flee the shores of the country is a corollary of bad governance. To such analyst, if Nigeria were better governed, the spectacle of desperate Nigerians besieging foreign embassies in search for visas would have been significantly reduced. Now that the British government has put an endless to speculations on the policy, the political fireworks are bound to heighten in the coming weeks.
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