Reactions to Britain’s travel ban on Nigeria in the wake of the Omicron COVID-19 variant continued in Nigeria’s senate and house of representatives yesterday as lawmakers roundly condemned such action.
While the senate said the ban is an attack on the diplomatic relations between the two countries, the house of representatives lawmakers said UK’s decision was an indication that all is not well in Nigeria.
The senate’s condemnation followed a motion sponsored a representative of Enugu West and former deputy senate president, Mr. Ike Ekweremadu.
While moving his motion Ekweremadu said Nigeria’s efforts in curbing the spread of COVID-19 is satisfactory, adding that the country has the lowest number of cases of the infection.
“The decision by the British government to include Nigeria in their COVID-19 list, with its concomitant implications, will affect many citizens of Nigeria, who had planned to spend their Christmas and New Year holiday with their families.
“Nigerians with genuine needs to visit the UK within this period will be denied visa and those with visa will not be allowed to enter the UK.
“Nigerians have consistently complied with all the COVID-19 protocols required by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UK government for travellers prior to this ban.
“Targeting African countries, especially in the COVID-19 travel ban, amounts to profiling and discrimination as well as an attack on our cordial diplomatic relationship with the UK,” he said.
Ekweremadu said hoarding of vaccines and the inability of low-income countries to get them should be addressed globally.
He asked the federal government to engage the UK authorities with a view to reversing the decision.
The motion was adopted by the senate after it was put to a voice vote by senate president, Mr. Ahmad Lawan.
For its part, the house of representatives members said the travel ban is a wake-up call to fix the country.
The lawmakers stated this at the plenary while contributing to a motion of urgent public importance sponsored by the minority leader, Mr. Ndudi Elumelu, on the need to intervene in the suspension of issuance of visitor visas to Nigerians by the UK.
Contributing to the motion, Enugu lawmaker, Mr. Nnaji Nwaedozie, said the ban was an indication that all is not right in Nigeria.
“We also need to understand that this thing is a wake-up call for Nigeria. It is not just about the UK; all over the world they are trying to block us. They are trying to tell us to go to hell, to go and fix our country.
“The problem we have is that we are not fixing this country and that is why we are having all these problems. At some point, we had issues with Ghana, they blocked us. At some point, we had issues with South Africa, they blocked us. Just last year, we had an issue with UAE, they blocked us; even our darling UK has now blocked us.
“It is not about racism; it is about telling us to go and fix our country. We have to sit down and fix our education, fix our health so that we don’t have a lot of people travelling out for medical check-up and educational support. In all sense, I believe that we should sit and find a way to solve our problem so that we won’t be getting this kind of insult from other countries,” he said.
In his contribution, Mr. Onofiok Luke (Akwa Ibom), said Nigerians need to shun ethnicity, as well as religious or political affiliations, and focus on developing the country.
“Our greater concern is the need for introspection. If we had built our country to be the giant of Africa, where we all join hands with the leadership to make sure that the right things are done, the right facilities are being put in place and we make sure that there a right assessment for any indices whether in the healthcare or education or even in tourism that leads our people to go en mass into other countries, I believe that we will not be much bothered with these challenges that we are faced with today,” he said.
“Wheresoever we are, wheresoever’s we come from, we have to rise in unison to support the leadership of this country. This is the time for us to fix our country. If there is any time that we must do the right thing and fix our country so that we avoid this embarrassment before us, the time is now. While we are blaming others, let us look inwards and fix ourselves,” he added.
Also contributing, Mr. Garba Muhammad (Kaduna State), called for the review of Nigeria’s membership of the Commonwealth, adding that the UK has “always been treating Nigerians with maximum contempt.”
“We have been in the Commonwealth, I don’t know the benefit we derive as members of the Commonwealth. In support of this motion, let us review our membership of the commonwealth,” he said.
