The culture of miscommunication and mistrust continues between Nigerian foreign missions and citizens in the diaspora.
A good number of us who reserved precious time committed huge amounts of money and took enormous risk on the road to honour appointments at the Nigerian Consulate in Atlanta Georgia were greatly disappointed recently.
I had gone to Nigerian mission in Atlanta, Georgia, United States to see the improvements that were being touted in the relational engagements and encounters with our “diplomats”, the choice to put the word diplomats in inverted comas is completely deliberate.
From the interactions I had with some of them, I cannot honestly vouch now or go on oath that these are trained and experienced technocrats.
In spite of the best efforts of the Nigerian Diaspora Organisation (N.I.D.O) and the activities of the recently created Diaspora Commission, one would expect that the focus of Nigerian Foreign Affairs Ministry would be “citizen diplomacy”.
Everything that shows at home in Nigeria, that the country is unraveling, is on display with the officials in Atlanta. There is no attitudinal discipline that you are appreciated as a Nigerian. Whether one lives or dies, the living is disrespected and dishonored in death.
In my younger days, growing up in Nigeria, I had accounts of the different frosty and lethargic responses dealt on respectable Nigerians. The attitude has not changed much since those times and dispensations.
I remember the respected Dr. Reuben Abati of the Guardian then, writing about “our men in New York”. I cannot forget journalism Patriarch Olatunji Dare writing elsewhere about the way we love to humiliate ourselves in the name of running embassies and consulates.
So people were coming with hyperbolic discussions on the improvements now noticeable in the way Nigerians are received and treated. And heaven itself would nod its approval on the time I had chosen for my “flight” to Atlanta.
Jesus Christ had strongly counseled elsewhere in the Holy Bible that the people of Jerusalem should pray that their flight should not come in Winter.
You try to make an appointment with the Mission in Atlanta, you will not get anyone to answer your phone calls. Your mails would be treated in an impersonal way. Do not think that things would be done with the usual American civility and standard. Welcome to Nigeria in America.
My acquittance with whom, had filed applications for passport renewal from December, 2020, the response to that request only came months later, and now we were on the trip for biometric capturing in the month of July, 2021. Only Nigeria would conduct business this way.
We drove from Kansas City, Kansas to Atlanta Georgia for fourteen hours. We did not ride into bumps or mild speed breakers, potholes or danger of being way-laid by bandits, kidnappers or insurgents. It was a nice and smooth ride. We drove through Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennesse and finally made it to Georgia.
The magnificence of the brushes, shrubs and thick growths was a challenge to depleted once famous flora and fauna of Nigeria.
I could not but marvel at the fact that tourism and culture, development and growth were not abstract ideas through which billions of petro dollars must always be stolen, but those are practical human endeavors that are often appreciated and seen, they have direct impact on the lives of citizens. Our roads in Nigeria are poorly constructed, poorly managed and they have become the abyss of doom for many citizens who would have contributed to transforming lives. Our roads are unpredictable. Not so with American roads.
I saw the grandeur of thickly forested mountains of Tennesse, through which we made joyful ride into the state of Georgia. Those elements at Dantata and Sawoe, who constructed the perilous road through Iwaro-Oka Akoko all the way to Epimi Akoko where several lives are often lost every year, even at the University town of Akungba Akoko, should take a trip to see how such precarious pits are handled so that human casualties can be minimized.
We arrived Atlanta in the evening of Monday, July 19, 2021 and to our chagrin, having gone through so much dangers and thrills, the consulate which had sent us invitations for July 20, 2021, a Tuesday would not open for business. They sucked us into the cesspool of official planlessness of a two day impromptu moslem holiday back in the homeland.
The consulate that was not opened to us all on Tuesday, July 20, 2021 and Wednesday, July 21, 2021, however allowed one manner less diaspora Nigerian into its premises. That Nigerian backdoor dealer was identified as a technician who came to fix things within. He did not dress like an artisan. He seemed to enjoy extraneous priviledge. He was insensitive to put his mouth in a business that was not meant to be his. He accused those of us protesting the ineptitude that led to the waste of money and our precious time. He said that could not be enough reason for us to “rant like mosquitoes”.
So that was when he got the lecture of his life. That was when he was told that the government of Nigeria and its officials could no longer be tolerated when they use demeaning words and epithets on citizens.
An official of the Consulate identifying himself as Mr. Tanko stepped into the melee and promised to ensure that fellow countrymen would be processed the following Thursday, a work day. Yes, Mr. Tanko came to work on Thursday, but he never bothered to ask about those of us whom he addressed that unfortunate Tuesday.
Scores of Nigerians sat in the blazing summer heat, sweating with no cooling system. It is far below normal American standard. Maybe to calm frayed nerves and feelings that were bruised, the consulate officials worked late into the evening to attend to everyone.
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It is true that conditions have improved from how things used to be, there is still much room for improvement. For example, more outlets and vendors, properly verified can be approved for each state in US to ease and decentralize capturing of biometrics through automated fingerprint identification process.
We accomplished our mission, but it was at some financial and material expense.
In moving around town, and visiting the Georgia Aquarium, some house-keepers had ransacked our belongings, stolen sixty dollars and my precious royal hat.
This took place at the La Quinta hotel in Atlanta. We still had to drive another fourteen hours back, taking the breath and awe of mid – American wonder.