Kenya’s President William Ruto, while addressing the three-basin climate change conference in Congo Brazzaville that was held over the weekend, stated that it’s bad for business for Africans to have to acquire visas to travel to other African countries.
According to Ruto, Africa loses out when individuals, businesspeople, and entrepreneurs are unable to travel due to visa restrictions.
“Let me say this: no African will be required to have a visa to come to Kenya by the end of this year. Our children on the African continent should not be locked in borders in Europe and also be locked in borders in Africa,” President Ruto said.
“It is time we realise that having visa restrictions amongst ourselves is working against us,” he added.
The African passport was introduced by the AU in 2016, and although the passport is still not widely available, the idea behind it is to allow all African citizens to travel throughout the continent without a visa.
Although there are bilateral agreements and regional agreements, there has been little progress in the direction of no restrictions.
However, most African nations are moving in the direction of streamlining entry procedures and removing barriers to some other countries, according to Africa’s Visa Openness Index, which gauges how welcoming each nation is to tourists from other African nations.
According to a 2022 AU-backed report, Kenya will join the Gambia, Benin, and Seychelles as the fourth African nation to implement the policy of granting unrestricted travel to its citizens. The first to do so in 2016 was the Seychelles, an island nation in east Africa that is primarily dependent on tourism.
The Visa Openness Index study suggests other actions for convenient travel throughout Africa if eliminating all visa requirements is regarded as excessive by other African countries at this time. These include cutting costs, requiring an electronic visa upon arrival for travellers from Africa, and putting in place a safe e-visa system.
