The former Nigeria High Commissioner to India, Major General Chris. S. Eze (rtd) on Saturday said the mass migration of Nigerians is a huge challenge that has come to stay unless a new Nigeria is created with a new mindset focused on the people.
General Eze said that the present situation should worry the Nigerian government, saying that deliberate efforts should be put in place to stem it.
Delivering a paper titled “National Challenges and Mass Migration: Reversing the Trend” as a Guest Lecturer at the 8th Reverend Engr Ette. I. Ette Annual Lecture Series at the National Engineering Centre, Abuja on Saturday, General Eze said even though the government does not appear to take the matter seriously, it remains a huge challenge.
According to Gen Eze, while the remittance back home is enticing to the government, it remains a problem because the bulk of the migrants are skilled youths on whom the future of our country rests and who have an enormous contribution to make to the development of our country.
In addition, Eze noted that the humiliation most of them go through abroad is undeserving of a people so blessed with natural and human resources, stating: “Many of our migrants also suffer degrading and racist treatments by their hosts abroad.”
The former Nigeria High Commissioner to India identified some variables responsible for this mass migration including “our serious economic situation, a loss of faith in our country, especially in its election processes, security threats to persons and their property, the relative ineffectiveness of our police force and its habit of brutalizing and extorting people.”
He regretted that even though Nigeria has an elaborate migration policy because it lacks the accurate statistics needed for effective planning, it cannot be relied upon to achieve much.
The General who offered a way of stemming the challenge noted that “the solution to our mass migration problem requires a wholesale remaking of Nigeria and a change of our mindset, which is very difficult to achieve because it involves tackling corruption, revamping our dilapidated infrastructure, and educational system, amending our electoral law and constitution if necessary.
He suggested the amendment of the Electoral along the lines already suggested by former VP Atiku Abubakar to enhance the chances of free and fair elections without which our government which controls the agencies of the state that are tasked with the responsibility of checking its officials cannot be held to account, and our judiciary taking serious steps to redeem its battered image and restoring the confidence in it which has been seriously eroded”
The High Commissioner also has some words of advice for our young ones’ corporate leaders: “Our professionals should try to jettison the one-man business culture which Nigerians are known for and pool their resources to build conglomerates that can compete with foreign-owned firms for business, at least in this country.”
Finally, General Eze admonished governments at all levels “to encourage such consolidation by patronizing local professionals who muster the will to engage in it but not at the expense of quality delivery. This cannot be done without a determined effort to fight corruption.”