The UK’s highest court issued its unanimous judgment on Wednesday, ruling that the UK plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda is unlawful, and all hell immediately broke loose on X formerly known as Twitter. Amidst this chaos, some painted this decision as a “Rwanda plan,” misconstruing the situation as if it were happening at the shores of Lac Kivu rather than at the Dover shores in England, where this year alone, 43 individuals, including three children, lost their lives while attempting the 21-mile crossing from Calais in France. Turning the solution to this problem into a Rwanda plan is absurd obviously, but absurdity seems to be the order of the day.
Firstly, Rwanda isn’t merely extending its customary humanitarian hand; it’s also a move that will rescue the coffers of UK taxpayers from bleeding dry. The asylum system’s saturation has driven the UK government to lavish over £6 million of taxpayers’ money daily on housing asylum seekers in hotels. It’s a madness that has spiraled, with the expenditure skyrocketing by over £2 million a day just since last year. As if this weren’t ludicrous enough, the government has announced plans to relocate many of these individuals from their hotels to abandoned military bases and floating barges. Meanwhile, UK taxpayers are paying over £1,429,804.59 in legal battles against the only solution available— the UK deal signed by Hon Priti Patel during her visit to Kigali in April 2022.
To add insult to injury, the UK Supreme Court’s ruling will only serve to embolden human traffickers, greasing the wheels for their profiteering off asylum seekers. They’re laughing all the way to the bank, pocketing up to 300,000 euros ($432,000) per boat that sneaks across the Channel. This year alone, these smugglers pocketed 69 million euros ($77.7 million), a whopping 2 million euros for every kilometer crossed. It’s a cash cow so juicy that they have paid off NGOs like the discredited Human Rights Watch and journalists like Michela Wrong to drag Rwanda’s reputation so that the UK plan doesn’t get implemented.
For all the anti-Rwanda propaganda peddled by all kinds of people paid by smugglers, the truth is Rwanda stands poised to tackle the UK’s gnawing migration problem, despite being ludicrously branded as less safe for the asylum seekers who continue to die at the bottom of the strait of Dover. Here’s another twist: Rwanda is already a safe haven for countless individuals fleeing persecution from across the globe, including Afghans who fled the Taliban after the collapse of the US/UK-backed Afghan government.
Finally, detractors of the UK scheme should know this – sorting out the UK’s internal political and legal quagmire isn’t Rwanda’s problem. Brits have repeatedly voiced their desire to curb immigration by voting the Conservatives into power in the last four general elections. They also backed Brexit in 2016, vowing to “take back control of our borders.” And let’s not forget, in the final European parliamentary elections, the Brits rallied behind the Brexit Party. So, if anyone’s upset about what the majority of Brits want, they should take it up with their government led by Rishi Sunak and stop dragging Rwanda into the mess!
ellenkampire