Having been out of the UAE for a clear one year, my business registration there, and the visa that came with it was nigh expired. The Economic Zone in which I registered Global Analytics Consulting advised that I need to get into the country before full expiry otherwise the visa and business registration may be cancelled in the system. That got me into a flap trying to organise tickets and everything else that goes with travelling these days.
Travelling anywhere these days feels bizarre, given the depression being marketed at home. Anyhow, I had moved my company from the UK to UAE effectively in 2012, after six tough years in the UK. The expenses and the taxes, the multiple layers of regulation, and the fact that no matter how hard you tried, you may not get a single business from within the UK made us flee. I couldn’t even totally extricate from the UK until 2014. Depressing place to do business.
I had been hearing about Dubai, UAE and one day I asked my UK staff, Syed, to get us cheap tickets to see what it was like. What I saw was not the ‘Onitsha market’ that some Nigerians said Dubai was. I reckon many get to Al Sabhka in Deira to buy cheap articles and believe that is the end of the UAE. The real country is however limitlessly inspiring.
The authorities had given us registered business people some forbearance from the normal six months visit requirement. They are very welcoming to business people and even though it’s your money you will spend, this is one place that makes life and living relatively cheap and ensures you get value for your spend. I tell people that Europe, and to a lesser extent the USA had altogether become tired of us Africans at some point, and the opening up of the UAE is a saving grace to many Africans who had been traumatised and defrauded in many an European and American embassies who believe everybody is trying to run away to their countries. I know of a situation where about five Vice Chancellors of Nigerian universities travelling into London were detained for about two days because some silly immigration guy thought they will not return home if allowed to enter London! Imagine the cockiness. So without places like the UAE many Africans may never have seen the possibilities of human achievements. We hope that some of our children will one day seize the initiative to replicate the ideas that are almost freely available in places like the UAE, on our continent; a continent which is basically an open canvass presently. If the Chinese are at least helping out with some infrastructure, the UAE offers travel and tourism opportunities, ideas for architects and builders and town planners, and for us businessmen, a very efficient base that places you in the centre of global markets, away from the snobbery of places like London, Paris and New York.
Ticket booked, I had to run around to get the COVID-19 test two days to travel. My forever-helpful and highly informed travel consultant wife gave me the names of approved centres and I ended up at EHA clinics at Lifecamp. N39,500 paid I drove in the next day to have that irritating stick poked deep into my nostrils and about nine hours later they had mailed me the result. NEGATIVE. I also had to do a travel insurance and print out an authority to travel to the UAE from a website before I could leave Nigeria. Abuja airport remains glistening even though I will advise that they understand that it is constant cleaning that helps maintain any facility. I see that in many of Nigeria’s installations they don’t care about cleaning suspended stuff, like Chandeliers or decorations. Those things must be reached otherwise in time they gather dirt and give us away. Travelling out of Nigeria was stress-free. Everybody kept their masks on during the flight but when dinner was served everybody took it off at the same time. I wondered whether eating will stop aerosolized breath from travelling around. There are a thousand ways this virus could spread even with the masks on, but that is story for another day. I just felt sad that somehow the world had been had and the media frenzy behind the disease is a pointer to the not-so-kosher beginnings of it and the intent it is meant to achieve.
We were forewarned to have our COVID-19 results out when we arrived Dubai seven hours later, and I thought I heard that some people may be required to take the test if their temperatures were high. What I did not expect was that EVERYBODY getting into Dubai will have to be tested FOR FREE. That was the first queue we entered. The entire hall was full. Dubai is still in business. A battery of nurses were available to interview travellers and issue test kits. Another army of nurses were there to insert the stick – again – in your nostrils and three hours later you get a text on your phone as to whether your result was negative or positive. Everyone is allowed to go to their places of abode. Dubai is testing millions of visitors absolutely free. The UAE is focused on the future, while some countries are stuck in the past. I believe that if someone has a positive result, you will also have medics at your hotel to whisk you away within three hours. A friend, who lives here, Tony, tells me of the 5-star treatment given to anyone who catches the disease here. In Nigeria, we use everything to show class. A friend railed recently against those who think COVID-19 is a scam but also said he was treated in VVIP ward. That means very, very important personality ward! Important personality is not enough. Very important is not enough. But very, very okay. Nigeria is not investing anything to get out of this problem except by trying to lock people down, asking struggling people to stay at home and I see that some elitist, mis-educated people are even pressurising government to keep public schools closed while their own overfed children get lectured through zoom – so that we can create millions more of illiterates and get thousands of SS1-3 girls pregnant and truncate their education right?
