[ad_1]
An The African pbadport is the most egalitarian of documents, in that if you have a course, the professional status and the professional invitations of the country visited do not matter. From university teachers to unskilled workers, anyone who has a pbadport issued by an African country will be treated the same way by British border agents. Moreover, they will not show any compbadion for the need to find their family or to see friends.
In fact, it is no exaggeration to say that an African pbadport is a document prohibiting travel. Even the countries of Africa are stingy with each other. I am a veteran visa applicant and I can tell you that there is no respite. A European visa is as difficult to obtain as a visa for a neighboring African country. My Sudanese pbadport meant that I had to become an Olympian visa applicant in order to be able to visit, study and install in the UK. You can not settle for a pbadport from a country on a terrorist watch list.
I can trace the fouling of the hostile Home Office environment over the last two decades through the various application processes of almost every possible British visa – student, student extension, family, vacation. I knew them all. I've measured my life in visa rejections and appeals. I asked for visas that do not even exist anymore.
In my experience, the so-called hostile environment policy is not only punitive for immigrants, but also for visitors – who, for the most part, are on a business or business trip or vacation. I like to keep the sense of humor in the formulation of rejections. A request from my mother to visit me in London was refused on the grounds that the evidence of our relationship was insufficient and that, therefore, there was no guarantee that she would return to her country of origin. I joked, "I'm going to annex copies of our WhatsApp conversations next time, tons of screenshots of his messages at unworthy hours that say, 'Are you still standing?' ". But the visa officer was less amused.
A parliamentary inquiry conducted this year showed that African claimants are twice as likely to be denied a nonimmigrant visa as those from other continents. Members asked for an inquiry. The findings of this survey were released this week and are overwhelming. The British visa system has been declared "unusable" because "inaccessible to many Africans". Chi Onwurah, Labor MP for Newcastle upon Tyne Central, said: "At a time when the UK needs to be" open to business, "the broken visa system is seriously undermining relations between the United Kingdom and the United Kingdom. Africa in several sectors. In addition to our relationships, it hurts our economy and our society. It is embarrbading, condescending and insulting for African candidates and leaves the slogan of "Global Britain" empty and meaningless. "
Academics in particular suffer. Among the people who were refused a visa, there were people who received funding, and even researchers invited to summits and conferences on the theme of Africa. In May, the London School of Economics organized a training workshop for African participants at its African summit. One in 25 participants is registered for the event; everything else has been denied a visa. In April, Sierra Leonean researchers specialized in Ebola were prevented from attending essential training in the United Kingdom, funded by the Wellcome Trust as part of a pandemic preparedness program. £ 1.5 million.
The reasons for rejection of visa applications (and the wording) are often arbitrary and degrading. One of the Ebola researchers received a letter saying that "on a balance of probabilities, we do not believe you are a researcher". One of the most cited reasons for rejection is that candidates will not return to their home country in Africa. Instead, they will choose to leave their careers in universities, their friends and family, get their visas and spend their lives working illegally in the UK. in low-paid cash jobs.
The implication (although the messages are not very subtle) is that life in Africa, whatever your circumstances, is to flee. If the cost of this is racial profiling and the exclusion of a whole cohort of African professionals and academics, which harms the research networks and the credibility of "Global Britain," that's the only way to do it. it is so.
Expect more, after the Brexit, as the British visa system is moving more and more toward facilitating "cap-in-hand" for those with the means, rather than those who will improve science, the culture and innovation of the country. There will be more expensive "entrepreneur" visas for wealthy Europeans and those in the Middle East who spend only summer in London and leave their vast uninhabited properties the rest of the year. Longer-term visitor visas will be granted to people whose only benefit to the UK is to pay for hotel rooms, restaurants and luxury shops.
The hostile environment of the Home Office is not only a racial profiler, it is also financial. There is little understanding of what an African researcher or visiting scholar can do for the UK. Show us that you are here to rent a suite at the Dorchester for a month or to launch your catch.
As companies prepare to leave the UK after Brexit, organizations, think tanks and university conferences across the country are also. The LSE will hold its next African summit not in London but in Belgium, because of the ease with which visas are granted to Africans, and the fact that so many African guests now refuse to go through the humiliating application process British visa. This is yet another way in which the UK is self-damaging. A hard lesson will be learned soon after Brexit. Whether for business, academia or just for holidays, other countries are available.
• Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist
Source link
