Visa for Ugandans

If you read the daily newspapers regularly – especially the letters to the editors – you may realize that Ugandans do not feel treated very fairly if their visa applications are rejected. Especially the Visa Section of the British High Commission has been accused of deciding and behaving unfairly for they do not always give reasons for their decision and for not refunding the application fee. Furthermore, it is often cited that people do have to start queuing in the early morning hours in front of the building which houses the Visa Handling Service.

Well, there are my two cents worth on it:

1. I have never seen a queue in the early morning hours and I had been able to see the V.H.S. building from my room for almost 20 months.
2. It is an application fee. That fee must be paid for the application. It has nothing to do with the outcome. That one is a statistically independent event – okay, not necessarily, if you follow the proper application requirements and processes it is deterministic and should lead the granting of a visa to the UK
   
   The application fee is not a bribe. This might sound surprising to some people in this neck of the woods, but it is a truth…

3. If someone does not get a visa it is probably because
1. One tried to cheat – and do not say, this sounds unreasonable. I personally witnessed cases in our embassy…
2. Did not follow the proper process.
3. Did not hand in all documents required.
4. Did not fulfil the visa requirements.
5. Did not come in time.

I might sound biased, but I am sure, this comes close to the truth...

Anyway, I do not want to work as an officer in the visa section of any embassy in Uganda. Okay, maybe in the one of those less favourite travel/immigration destinations of the Ugandans. I do not want to start guessing which countries those may be, but I would bet North Korea would be one of it… But I also would not like to live and work for the North Koreans, either.

So, another eventful weekend lies ahead and I wished I had a clue, where I will be in two months time.

Ah, and it will be a weekend with internet at home. I am wondering how this MTN thing will work. If I post tomorrow, it works. But since even my senior American colleagues complain, I fear I will just use the service for free as long as possible and then hand it back without subscribing to it.