By Babajide Alabi
MR FARAGE’s NEW POLITICS
Nigel Farage’s “New Politics” will one day in the future become a subject of history taught to college students, but before that time he has a lot of groundwork to cover. While he may be “punching” one or two odd supporters of the Tories, majority still believe he cannot be trusted with policies he is pushing. This is a man married to a German wife whom he employs as his secretary yet always screaming murder that EU citizens are taking British jobs. Ironic and classic politics!
WHAT IS WRONG WITH IMMIGRATION?
To a British politician a year before the general elections, everything is wrong. There is the sudden realisation that the country is populated by too many foreigners with laughable accents and hard to pronounce surnames. If you ask why are the citizens so angry at immigrants from outside EU? There are no clear cut answers.
On a critical analysis of the issues we will discover it is not the African or Asian immigrants that “compete” with the “locals” to take the houses. No. It is not the family from Africa or Asia that is on the “dole queue” for kids living in home countries. No.
It takes donkey years for most African immigrants to qualify for benefits, if they ever do with the new immigration policies. And come to think of it, there are thousands of decent African immigrants who even though are qualified but choose to stay off the benefit systems.
Farage has brought the EU immigration costs, negatives, positives etc to the fore. It might be too late to resolve the UK membership of the Union, but I, like many British-Africans are enjoying the debate. The searchlight is now on EU immigration as the race for 10 Downing Street hots up.
COMING IN FROM THE COLD
I am always amused when I watch the UK Prime Minister, David Cameron, trying to sound tough on immigration. He looks like someone who has just got his mojo back.
Fours years ago at the start of his tenure and the parliament, he talked so tough on immigration that even immigrants with well earned British citizenship became scared. He was all over the places on how he would bring down the net migration figure and also cut visas from Non-EU countries. Almost at the end of the parliament, what has he done differently? Nothing! No, one thing. He succeeded in making the UK a number three choice for foreign students. Yet, he is still talking tough. Many think he should hold his hands up and accept failure, rather than the new “bold face” approach he is adopting.
IS ED KEEPING HIS HEAD?
After surviving the “exit coup”, the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, has been playing smart. He is keeping his cool. Not saying much on anything and particularly on the EU migration debate but insisting on his earlier stand that UK shall not dump the EU. A wise decision, if you ask me. This keeps voters wondering if the guy is really capable of taking charge.
Let’s keep watching as the race hots up and Cameron steps up his “anger” on EU. But we pray, may the loudest not be the winner.
NIGERIA: THE AGENDA FOR 2015 AND BEYOND
However, back home in Nigeria the 2015 General Elections is in focus too. The two major parties in the country recently conducted primaries and picked presidential candidates. Retired General Mohammed Buhari emerged as the flag bearer for the opposition party – All Progressives Congress (APC) while the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan is the anointed candidate for the largest political party in Africa – the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
Not devoid of the usual drama, there have been intrigues as the countdown to the General Elections begins. This is against the run of events in decent societies. Elections are supposed to engage lively debates, whereby candidates would tell the world how they will go about running the government.
Surprisingly, none of the political parties is pushing any agenda as the driving force for the elections. For an election holding in February, it is not out of place to expect these parties to be enlightening the public on their planned policies for education, health, security etc. rather what we are witnessing are petty and cheap blackmail, with both parties trying to “outshout” the other.
Will these be the winning strategies for the 2015 General Elections? We wait and see.
– See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/12/immigration-big-issue-uk-2015-general-elections-2/#sthash.8BFT2xAw.dpuf
