ECONOMY
The Chairman, Trade, Investment and Business Immigration, African Bar Association, Mark-Anthony Nduka-Eze, Attorney at Law, shared with Uchechukwu Nnaike and Chris Asika his interest in business and corporate immigration programmes created to promote trade and investment collaboration for corporations, investors, traders and experienced business managers and executives within African countries and between African and non-African countries; and the advantages of global business immigration to assist Nigerian businesses to identify trade partnerships and build stronger markets
Business immigration facilitates the movement of goods and services across borders and enables investors, traders and professionals to acquire favorable permanent immigration status in developed countries with benefits like: access to dollar denominated loans at affordable and low interest rate; access to affordable medical care and access to the best university education without paying international school fees, thereby reducing corruption and conserving foreign currency in Nigeria.
These benefits enable families to access quality education at a reasonable cost and also obtain work permit status in these countries, Nduka-Eze told THISDAY.
He said Nigerians should strive to acquire dual citizenship, including their children, so as to aid opportunity for college and graduate education at affordable cost at the best institutions anywhere in the world because today parents are paying more school fees as they are getting older, instead of saving more for their retirement. As a result, he said they get poorer as they are getting older, stressing the need to earn foreign currency as individual business owners through opportunities like AGOA and AFCFTA, focusing on exportable products other than oil, which is no longer sustainable because of the fall in oil prices.
“What I advise Nigerian entrepreneurs is to open branches/subsidiaries in Canada, USA, Rwanda, China, Europe and the rest of the world because the company branches out there automatically become an artificialcitizen of that country and you can now source financing with very low interest rates. You have to think deeper, think global but act locally. Today the digital world allows you to do that sitting inside your shop in Onitsha or Kano, from where you can conquer the whole world using your brain wisely, not just for showing off.”
Sharing his experience, he said: “After graduating from the University of London, England with a Law degree, I moved to America, I found that I could not easily take the Bar exams in the USA because I have a foreign law degree, the Bar in the USA will not admit you to practice law in their jurisdiction until you return to the American University to read law once more, for another three years, an impossible undertaking because of the huge financial implications. I felt that where there is a will, there must be a way, so I conducted an extensive research of the admission rules of the state bar of all the fifty states and found that one of the states gives a waver and thus will allow me to sit for the bar examinations with only a law degree and that’s New York. The rest is history as they say.
I have a law firm in California today and an IT firm also here in Nigeria that partnered with Samsung to introduce the Etiam/Samsung smart education project in Nigeria, to drive learning in schools using tablets and educational contents, as well as train youths in vocational ICT training to acquire practical skills and reduce unemployment among the youth.” According to Nduka-Eze, Nigerians have proved to be the most and fastest growing immigrants in the USA because of their commitment to success where they are given a fair and a level playing field. From my experience what we need in Nigeria is to think global. Another benefit is that Nigerian immigrant investors through programmes can obtain permanent residency or outright citizenship through investment of a certain sum. Traders can acquire permanent visas in the USA, Canada, and Europe by investing a certain sum of money and will qualify to borrow money at low interest rates, buy homes with mortgage, etc.”and re-invest in Nigeria with their long term funds.
For traders that import goods from China, Nduka-Eze disclosed that Nigerian traders are entitled to two years long term Chinese business visas. “It should be noted that Nigerian traders are continuously issued with short term visitors visas of less than six months duration, although their purpose of visiting China is usually for business. This is the wrong visa classification since most Nigerians are not interested in visiting the Great Wall of China as they only travel to China to conduct trade and business.
“This short term visitor’s visa has resulted in our traders being criminalised by the Chinese government upon the expiration of the visa, as well as our traders being cheated out of their financial contributions by their Chinese partners who are given these monies by their Nigerian partners to conduct business in China. With a long term visa and your own Chinese company and bank account, your money is safe and secure. The Chinese government has a business and employment visa classification that most African traders should apply for to enable them to spend the long duration normally required to develop their business in China.
“The benefits of business classification visas are immense because they provide a permanent visa required for business operation. The African business owner can set up their corporate bank account and qualify to borrow money in local currency at low interest rate and avoid the current situation where their investment is usually placed at risk by some local partners who take advantage of the expiration of their short term visitor’s visa and the consequent imprisonment of these traders by the Chinese enforcement authorities, turning an immigration violation into a criminal offence, thereby making it impossible for these traders to renew their visa in future, Nduka-Eze added.
As a country of over 200 million people, he said Nigeria can enter into trade treaties with countries such as USA, Canada, UK and others to obtain exclusive business visa classification such as treaty trader and treaty investor visas, reserved for investors and traders of both treaty countries. It is worth noting that countries such as Cameroun, Togo and Ethiopia has such business visa concessions with USA, while Nigeria as the second largest trading partner of the USA in Africa, do not have such business visa privileges for their business people.
“All these trade opportunities can also be duplicated under the African Free Trade Agreement where you have over 1.2 billion people to market your goods and services.
“You can use your corporate status, professional, trade and entertainment business to acquire permanent immigration status in any of the developed countriesand ultimately to gain residency or citizenship through intra-company transferee visas, treaty investor, treaty trader and various types of investment visas. The opportunity to access funds at low interest in the western world and invest in African for higher returns is open to traders, investors, entertainers and professionals,” he said.
