Deputy Prime Minister kicks against £3000 visa bond on Nigerians

Since the announcement of proposed refundable £3000 visa bond, more prominent British leaders have continued to speak out against the British government’s plan to impose the visa bond on Nigerians among other select nations.

Government and business concerns in the affected countries have condemned the proposal, and the British government has not said how many visa applicants will have to pay the bond. The UK government plans to commence a pilot project in November involving “high-risk” countries. Some visitors will have to pay a £3,000 ($4,800) deposit, which will be refunded upon departure but forfeited if travellers overstay their visas.

The plan is to make foreign visitors from Nigeria, Ghana, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka routinely pay a security deposit to come to the U.K., an idea that has spurred outrage in countries such as India and Nigeria.

Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said his Liberal Democrat Party and its Conservative coalition partners had “differences of emphasis” on the plan, and details were still being discussed in government. Clegg told BBC “I am absolutely not interested in a bond which becomes an indiscriminate way of clobbering people who want to come to this country…”

He said further that the bonds “are certainly not going to go ahead” on that basis. “Of course in a coalition I can stop things,” he added.

Matter of Immigration is a sensitive political issue in Britain, especially with the unemployment and austerity measures brought on by the economic crisis. Prime Minister David Cameron has pledged to cut net immigration from 252,000 a year in 2010 to below 100,000 a year by 2015.