Namibia turns the visa tables on Western nations

I remember a story from many years ago where an Indian coworker was complaining that his parents tourist visa to the US got denied again. I thought this was really unjust and I was commiserating with him about why the US would even care. He said “because people come over on a tourist visa from India and never leave.” I said that was ridiculous because it’s limiting tourism and he said “No, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. They’re 75 so they’ll just stay here the rest of their lives. Customs will never actually do anything.”

I think of that every time I read stories like this.

Namibia's official language is English https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Namibia

There are a number of other languages which are the native languages of most of the population, but English is the only official language of the country. When I was there as a tourist they told me that it was chosen after independence because it would be equally difficult to learn for every ethnic group.

It was slightly longer than my thesis, although much shorter to complete -- unless you include failed previous attempts. To date, it remains my magnum opus of bureaucratic compliance.

It's a frustrating and moderately expensive experience, that I would otherwise never have learned about as a Canadian citizen.

Meanwhile, a visa to enter Vietnam for 3 months from a Western nation is a fee and a rubber stamp. A fascinating problem arising from that is the number of undocumented migrant workers we get from the West! It's been a thing for a decade, but in the past was mainly people offering English lessons who did not meet the requirements for a work permit. It's expanded significantly in scope post-Covid, although I don't have any hard numbers to share.

I feel it's quite fair to expect some visa costs/paperwork when no fair and bilateral visa arrangement exists. On the other hand, the level of noncompliance with the terms of the issued visas worries me. I'm a documented immigrant to Vietnam, I run a small and boring company. If the rules change in a crackdown, will I get caught up in a regulatory net meant to catch someone else? Losing my company this way would be really disheartening.

I'm unable to think of an easy fix to the asymmetrical unfairness of visas -- but I thought you might enjoy a slice of what it looks like from the other side. I guess immigrants anywhere are presented with many of the same challenges.

People want to move to richer countries where even menial jobs pay much much more than their home countries, and they can enjoy more advanced infrastructure that's been built up over generations. Quite often money is then sent 'back home'.

People moving the other way (west to developing nation) often bring skills or plenty of savings with them. That's not always true in both cases of course (plenty of skilled doctors want to move to the west, plenty of unemployed drunks from the west want to move somewhere cheaper, etc).

In this case, already having some family living in the country must be a red flag that the applicant might easily find a job and a support network and then petition to stay.

The whole thing sucks and is unfair, but there it is. One day hopefully we will not need national borders, but it is not this day.

Anyway, requiring a visa on entry is pretty normal. And since they hand them out on arrival, it's more of a tax than a bureaucratic hurdle. I remember having to pay for a visa when entering Turkey in the late nineties. You had to pay cash to get a stamp in your passport. Just a formality. They had very high inflation at the time (higher than now) and you had to pay in your own currency instead of Turkish Lira. Dutch Guilders in my case (this was pre-euro) So, this was a nice way to get foreign currency into the country for them. Clearly it was about the money and not about Dutch people outstaying their welcome in Turkey.

Likewise, Namibia doesn't have an immigration problem but they can probably use the cash.

We have a problem in the UK and other countries that the cost of that has become so high. From another article:

>The Home Office claims that the average cost per night of providing hotel accommodation to asylum seekers is £140, which does not include the costs to local services. It says that the estimated total cost to the taxpayer over five years would far exceed £150,000 per asylum seeker.

There must be a better way to do things. I mean like let them apply online if they really need asylum, otherwise send them back. The legal system seems to have run amok that any rando can say I claim asylum and then be pretty much unremovable at a huge cost to the local tax payers.

And given that it’s a fairly small amount in western context it’ll probably be ok.

I expect this to increase globally. Kinda glad I have two rather diff passports.

> These include all “non-reciprocating countries” - meaning the new visa rules will affect citizens from all countries that require Namibian passport holders to have visas.

I’m curious what this is meant to achieve. There is zero chance those western countries would be open to Visa free travel to Namibia. It’d be political suicide with the latest right wing wave and no one cares about the Skeleton coast and deserts of Namibia enough to apply any pressure.

Is this policy just for domestic consumption or a cash grab?