WHAT BAN ON ENTERING AMERICA VISA LOTTERY MEANS TO NIGERIA!!

Editor’s note: There are over three million Nigerians residing in the US. Because we have long ago surpassed the quota issued by the American Diversity Visa program, in 2013, Nigerians have been barred from entering the country via the Green Card Lottery. The Naijaonpoint.com columnist Mawuna Koutonin, our guide into the realms of African identity and all things Nigerian, explains what this means for our country in the long term — as hopefuls all over the world are preparing to try their luck in less than a month.
In 20 days, on October 1st, the American Visa Lottery, also know as the Green Card Lottery, will open for the year 2016 selection.
Millions of people around the world will fill in an online form, hopeful for their chances to go to America to enjoy the “American dream”.
Fifty-five thousand people are selected every year to migrate to the United States together with their families.
Unfortunately, for the second time in the fifteen-year history of the American Visa Lottery, Nigerians have been disqualified from entering, until further notice from the State Department. In September 2013, Nigeria was added to the list of ineligible countries.
Why?
The Diversity Visa program states: “Those born in any territory that has sent more than 50,000 immigrants to the United States in the previous five years are not eligible to receive a diversity visa.
“The term 50,000 “immigrants” refers only to people who immigrated via the family-sponsored, employment, or immediate relatives of U.S. citizen categories, and does not include other categories such as refugees, asylum seekers, NACARA beneficiaries, or previous diversity immigrants.”
Nigeria had reached that quota.
Explaining the decision, a spokesman of the American embassy in Abujasaid: “Nigerians are leaders in the United States. A recent study found, for example, that Nigerians were among the most well-educated immigrant groups in America. As recently as 1944, there were exactly 22 Nigerian students in the US. Today there are over 7000, and they make up the largest group of African students in America.  You’ve sent us some of your best, from the late, great Chinua Achebe to Bartholomew Nnaji, one of the world’s top professors of robotics, to basketball legend Hakeem Olajuwan, considered one of the greatest NBA centers of all time.”
As the comment above shows, it is often the most literate, well-trained doctors, engineers, nurses, craftsmen, etc, who are transfered to America in stroke of the lottery.

According to our estimation, based on the average $250 000 budget necessary to raise a kid from birth to adulthood, the visa lottery transfers the equivalent of 137 billions dollars demographic asset to the USA, every year.
During the last 10 years, the demographic influx has compounded half a million immigrants, or the equivalent of 1,3 trillion dollar-worth demographic asset.
Beyond the financial and mineral plundering of the poor countries by the rich, the demographic plundering is something that is bleeding dry the most vulnerable countries in the world to a much larger extent, while these countries do, in fact, desperately need those skills to solve their domestic problems.
The USA is not alone in the business of demographic plundering. The European Union countries have devised clever schemes to steal best talents from third-world countries without shame. From scholarship to qualified immigration incentives, the rich countries are now directly reaching out to our local doctors, nurses, analysts, managers to encourage them to leave their country.
The demographic war never makes the mainstream news, but it is currently the most-fought war by the world powers.
Nigeria alone had shifted close 300,000 of its best talents to the united States during the last decade. And, according to the Nigeria Diaspora Day website, there are now about 3.25 million Nigerians living in America, from those who are”first arrivals” to fourth-generation Nigerians. Of this number, there are over 115,000 medical professionals, 174,000 IT professionals, 87,000 pharmacists, 49,500 engineers, and over 250,000 legal, financial, real estate and related business professionals.
The alarming transfer of skills from Nigeria to America had forced the State Department to add Nigeria to the list of ineligible countries.
Is that bad or good for Nigeria?
On a closing note, in average, immigrants share 10 to 20% of their earnings with their home country, mainly through remittances. And the Nigerian diaspora just sent 21 billion back home last year alone.