What Class of Citizen?

First published on the 14th of April 2007, it was an account of the humiliation I suffered at the French embassy in London when I was invited to participate at a Writer's Festival. The invitation was important in itself because a local Nigerian poet who apparently had made contributions to the community had unfortunately passed away and I was to do a form of eulogy.
To put it in sort form, my treatment at the embassy was shocking, the staff were rude and condesending. Despite all my papers and ticket being in good order, it was one random excuse after the other. Later the woman just came out with 'sorry we're not convinced about your class of  Nigerian citizenship'! Please what is that?!

Remember some time ago, I was so excited about going to France for a writing do and what not, well I can tell you, I've never had disappointment like that before. I went to the French embassy and for two long days, I was shunted from one red tape to the other, after numerous phone calls, explanations, etc, I got the message loud and clear, 'we don't want you in our country! Mainly because you're black and we do not believe that you are a writer. Besides what do you write that is so good, you've been invited to France for it?'


I tell you, I have never been so humiliated in my life, the people who invited me were so embarrassed but what could we do?

Taking from that, I think we all learnt something, for myself, that I must always remember, while away from home, I become a chameleon, my identity has changed, I'm no longer a female writer, I am a black female writer and in a lot of places that would always come first, for my inviters (I know, I couldn't just find the right word) there must be no naiveté about discrimination and no assumption that everything is straight forward because it isn't. I kept being asked 'why do you need a visa?' I wanted to scream!

But we are only beaten not down, many good things are happening and will continue to happen, we must just always, ALWAYS keep the faith and our heads up and high.