By Harry Awurumibe, Editor, ABUJA BUREAU
Mr. Richard Montgomery, British High Commissioner to Nigeria, has explained reasons the United Kingdom placed restrictions on Nigerian students from bringing their family members into the UK.
Prompt News reports that the UK Government recently announced the new policy which bars students from bringing their families into the country.
Defending the decision, Montgomery argued that the issue about restrictions of students bringing dependents does not affect only Nigerians but people from all over the world.
Speaking further on the issue, he said: “Last year for example, the UK granted 3 million new visas of which 325,000 of those visas were between Nigeria and the UK.
“So, Nigerian visitors constitute over 10 per cent of the people coming to London and the UK.
“On the issue of students’ visas, I will also like to provide the contest; that the number of Nigerian students coming to the UK has increased five fold in the last three years; it is a fantastic success story for our universities and we are really delighted that so many Nigerians are coming to the UK.
“On the issue about restrictions of people bringing dependents; that is not just for Nigeria but many parts of the world; many more students are trying to bring their dependents with them; and I think there are two issues here; the first is –it is not always possible to find housing services to meet all the needs of all our existing students population.
“Secondly, I think reasonable people will accept that we have to manage our visitor numbers and that we have to manage migration in and out of the UK; just as the Nigerian government does for your own borders”.
