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I applied for a Chinese visa in London yesterday. With my British passport, I was categorically told my express application will take precisely 3 days. While going through my papers, the officer realised my company is a Nigerian based company and the story changed!
I was asked to produce my Nigerian passport & not eligible for express service as the office in China will have to run a special check on my application. Average turn around time is 4 days but no guarantee as it depends on "what they find". From being 0 risk to potential criminal
My Nigerian passport automatically qualifies me for criminal check in China. I am now going to miss 2 potential investors meeting in Paris (hopefully not more). This is untop of the cost of returning to London with "The Nigerian" passport.
This is just one of the many harrowing lived experience of a Nigerian (+ black male). How do Nigerian rich folks survive this horrendous reactions to our poor reputation? It is a major source of stress for me. I can't imagine my kids living through this.
This is one reason I am not a big fan of the camp who thinks the bulk of our problems in Africa can be sorted through positive narrative. Yes, we need to fix & own our narrative but the root cause of the stereotype needs to be dealt with. These are problems no one will fix for us
How much do we invest as a nation in combating CyberCrime? We leave the problem to the West to fix thinking it is their money being stolen. Our small businesses & people can't take their rightful place in global commerce without wasting resources to bypass hoops. They make us pay
The rest of the world will always take knee jerk reactions to our lack of decorum - exclusion. It is the easiest way to deal with people like us. If you don't know which one will be a criminal, why waste resources trying to ascertain? Easier to "exclude".
Nigeria can be great. We have all it takes but the commitment! The world is so complex that we can't find a way out of this problem with the same set of people who led us into. We don't have the luxury to have incompetent people running a country in need of urgent attention.
We think we've seen it all. #Afctfa is about to unleash truck loads of hate on us. The hate from across Africa that's been going undocumented and ignored is about to get real. We have ourselves and lack of leadership to blame. No one else.
...and yes, I feel depressed and miserable. Knowing we do not have the leadership to deal with this. Knowing the system is rigged against those who may want to try. Knowing we have no means of empowering the best amongst us to have a go. Something must give!
