The Observer (Kampala)
Richard M. Kavuma
24 January 2008
As the American Government raises the cost of trying to secure permission to enter that country this month, our investigations reveal Ugandans spend more than Shs 300 million on visas to the US and UK every month.
A statement issued by the US Embassy in Kampala late last year said Ugandans seeking a visa to America should pay $131(Shs 221,000), an increase of 31 percent from the previous $100 (Shs 169,000). The money must be paid by all applicants whether they get the visa or not.
"The increase in the visa application fee is a global fee increase implemented by the US Government. The fee increase was necessary because the previous fee of $100 did not cover the costs incurred with new security-related processing, new information technology systems, and inflation," the statement said.
The cost
The new visa fees will increase the amount of money Ugandans and other people in Uganda pay to the American government for this all-important airport pass.
In an e-mail to The Weekly Observer, embassy spokesperson Lisa Heilbronn refused to disclose the number of applications the embassy receives per year. But figures available from the website www.travel.state.gov show that in 2006, nearly 4,000 Ugandans got American visas. Some 74 percent of these sought non-immigrant business/tourist visas, which excludes immigrant and student visas.
Using figures from this website, it is estimated that at least 7,000 people applied for visas from and in Uganda. Taking the flat non-immigration visa rate of $100, it means that the applying Ugandans paid at least $700,000 (Shs 1.183 billion) in visa fees in the year 2006. This equals Shs 99 million per month. If the same number of Ugandans applies for visas this year, the annual bill will go up to Shs 1.55 billion (Shs 129 million per month) thanks to the new rates.
Yet the cost of trying to travel to the US fades in comparison to the United Kingdom.
According to figures from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 12,872 people applied for UK visas in Kampala in 2006. Taking a flat visa rate of £63 per tourist visa, it means that the British High Commission here collected at least £810,936 (Shs 2.676 billion) that year. Per month, the high commission's visa office collected Shs 223 million.
On average, therefore, Ugandans paid Shs 322 million per month to try and get visas to Britain and America, two of Uganda's most important development partners. Yet for British visas, Uganda's 2006 figure was lower than that for 2005, when 16,647 people applied in Kampala.
The price
Although applying for a visa is that costly, not application succeeds. In 2006, for instance, of the 5,146 people who applied for tourist/business visas at the US Embassy in Kampala, 43 percent (2,213) failed. This means that the Shs 374 million these people paid was in vain.
The situation is not much different for the UK. Forty-eight percent (6,170) of the 12,872 applications for visas to Britain in 2006 were rejected. In this case, the money paid by the unsuccessful applicants was Shs 1.283 billion.
One reason many visa applications fail is because applicants fail to convince officials that they are going to the rich countries to visit or study or do business and come back to their countries without burdening the host taxpayers. The visa policy of the US Government for instance, assumes that all applicants (even for business/tourist visas) intend to stay illegally in America once their visas have expired. It is hence up to the applicant to convince the embassy that they will return to Uganda.
Because this can be difficult for people who want a chance to land in a western country and do odd jobs, commonly known as Kyeyo, many companies have come up charging as much as Shs 2.5 million to help one acquire a visa.
As visa fees at embassies like the American increase, visa seekers will have to dig deeper in their pockets.
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