The Home Office’s hostile handling of visiting African professionals doesn’t bode well for Global Britain

An African passport is the most egalitarian of documents, in that if you have one then class, employment status and professional invitations from the country you are visiting all count for nothing. From university professors to unskilled labourers, anyone holding a passport issued by a country in Africa will be treated the same by UK border officers. They will also show no compassion for or recognition of the need for people to be reunited with family or to see friends.

In fact it’s not too far-fetched to say an African passport is a no-travel document. Even countries within Africa are miserly with each other. I am a veteran visa applicant, and I can tell you there is no respite. A European visa is as prohibitively hard to secure as one to a neighbouring African country. My Sudanese passport meant that I had to become an Olympian visa-applier in order to visit, study and settle in the UK. You can’t slouch with a passport from a country on a terror watchlist.