The President of the African Development Bank, AfDB Dr. Akinwumi Adesina has likened the controversial travel ban imposed by the UK, Canada and a number of mainly Western countries to apartheid against Africa and says it is endangering the lives of people on the continent.
Adesina also called for the immediate lifting of the travel bans given as it the Omicron variant of the coronavirus has now been found in virtually every country on earth.
In a tweet Sunday night, Adesina said, “now that omicron has been found in many non-African and developed countries, why are travels from those countries not banned?
Read Also: UK travel ban: Passengers stranded over flight cancellations
“ Why single out African countries?
“Singling out African countries is very unfair, non-scientific and discriminatory.
“Global vaccines and travel apartheid against Africa are endangering lives, jobs and livelihoods, from a pandemic Africa did not cause.
“End the apartheid. Respect Africa,” the AfDB president said.
Read Also: Omicron: UK adds Nigeria to its travel red list
More than 15 European countries have reported the presence of Omicron but none of them is on the UK ban list for instance and many have called it a new form of racism.
On Sunday the Nigerian Government lashed out at the UK for its harsh covid restrictions against Nigerians, saying that most of the in-bound passengers that tested positive for COVID-19 were from the UK,
The Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire speaking on television said, “because of the very large volume of travellers from the UK, we also have the most positive COVID-19 virus coming from the UK too.”
Ehanire described as unfortunate the knee-jerk reaction of some countries to the Omicron strain. He noted that even the World Health Organisation had said recently that countries should focus more on collaboration rather than shutting borders.
“At the moment we have no plans restricting anybody coming from another country,” he said.
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