To come home or not to come home? The African Diasporan’s dilemma
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With the global financial crisis still in effect in many parts of the world, African migrants in the Diaspora often contemplate returning to their home countries in Africa where economic growth has fared far better than other parts of the world. Many financial analysts refer to the financial crisis as the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s resulting in evictions, foreclosures and long periods of unemployments.
Africans in the Diaspora have not been spared from the crisis’ assault with many losing their jobs and homes as a result. At the same time, strong prospects abound in their home countries for African Repatriates as they are often called who can bring home their skills, knowledge and experience from the West to build African economies.
However, the trade offs are often not that simple, with many returnees having to take significant comfort adjustments and pay cuts on their return home.
On popular African forums such as Nigeria’s Nairaland, questions abound about what remuneration back home would make sense for a returnee given peculiar infrastructural challenges in many African countries ranging from power cuts to dilapidated infrastructure. Others are worried that they would be alienated or too disconnected from the culture in which they were nurtured from childhood. And many more wonder if they should wait out the economic crisis despite its painful impact on their wallets and financial prospects.
But more importantly, many wonder if the times present a justifiable opportunity for them to be a part of the continent’s growth story. With rapid growth across various sectors in countries like Ghana, Nigeria and Kenya, Africa is fast becoming an attractive investment target globally for investors with a healthy appetite for high risk, high reward environments.
“Top of my list of reasons for returning to Lagos is a desire to contribute to Nigeria,” a 35-year-old Harvard graduate and African returnee Seyi Boroffice said on his return to Lagos, where he is home again after 15 years of living overseas during an interview
“The upside and opportunity is incredible. In terms of possibilities, I’d say Nigeria is comparable to the UK at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.”
The result has been a brain gain that has seen returnees flood global corporations such as McKinsey, Mastercard and Samsung across the continent. Some come to start their own businesses in the continent’s risky terrain hoping to be the next Aliko Dangote, the African businessman whose business interests in Nigerian commodity markets has led him to become the world’s richest black man.
However, while many believe that the Diaspora has a lot to offer by returning to their countries of birth, some others beg to differ.
“What sense would it make for highly qualified doctors, engineers, researchers – who are working in advanced technology settings in the western world – to relocate or move to fragile states where they can only apply a tiny percent of the knowledge they have acquired? I think that the issue is to put in place mechanisms that would allow them to help the continent, even from afar. A return of the Diaspora should not or cannot be artificially orchestrated – it will come with the improvement of social, economic and political situation in countries,” said Margaret Kilo, Head, Fragile States unit at the African Development Bank (AfDB) during an interview hosted by the AfDB.
The question of whether or not to return to the continent remains a dilemma that plagues most Diasporans.
Though, despite the tough call, for many who have made the leap, the answer is crystal clear.
For instance, here is what Okechukwu Muogilim, a Diaspora returnee who lived in the U.S. and the U.K. for about 15 years had to say:
“The West is saturated.There are opportunities. This is the place to be.”
Is Africa indeed the place to be? If you are a Diaspora returnee, please share your thoughts with us by e-mailing publisher@cp-africa.com. Select responses will be published on CP-Africa.
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