Tanzania's traders, policy makers and politicians have expressed their concern with regard to UK Visa being processed in Kenya. Tanzanians and other East Africans wishing to travel to the UK will now have their visa applications processed in Nairobi as part of an overhaul of visa-issuing procedures worldwide. Under the new rules applicants will need to make their request at least six weeks ahead of travel and the British High Commission in Dar es Salaam will no longer be able to issue visas at short notice.

The change comes under the auspices of the new "Hub and Spoke Visa Processing" operation involving the reduction of the number of visa-issuing posts across the globe in order to reduce processing costs. Their main concerns are being directed to UK immigration rules, bureaucracy and a perceived assumption that Africans only travel to the UK with an intention to stay there. They said, the reason why most Tanzanians are being refused the Visa to the UK is still not known, "Tanzanians have been facing many refusal when applying for the UK visa, I do not know the motive behind this," lamented one of the Dar es Salaam residents, Mr. Yasin Abdullah.

East African Business Week thought to collect views from different citizens who have had an experience with Visa application to the UK and Mr. Abdullah, a businessman based in Dar es Salaam, was on of them. He told East African Business Week last week that he has been importing electrical products from various countries "Such a thing has been frustrating me for many years, and to be frank, I do not think there is any day in which I can think of doing business with UK."

The businessman complained that the UK move has been paralyzing trade between the two countries and if efforts to shift UK visa processing to Dar failit will cause loss of trade. Another trader Sule Katto, who has now shifted his businesses to China noted, "I wonder, why UK process our visa in Nairobi while we have a full-fledged embassy here."
He noted, British High Commission in Dar es Salaam is like a postal office, it just receives the documents and post to Nairobi nothing else, this is very embarrassing.

In order to apply for UK visa, Tanzanian nationals should make an initial application on line before presenting their passport and supporting documentation to High Commission officials in Dar es Salaam. The paperwork will then be sent to the Kenyan capital for processing. Successful applicants can expect to receive their visa three weeks thereafter; the whole process takes about six weeks from start to finish.

The business community has said this has been paralyzing trade between Tanzania and the UK. So as to promote trade between the two countries, they asked Britain to rethink and start processing UK visa in Dar es Salaam. "We are aware that Britain's Immigration rules are very complicated but also Kenyans working at the High Commission in Nairobi are another reason behind this refusal," said Mussa Hassan, a Dar es Salaam resident. He noted "I lived in Kenya and, from my experience, most Kenyans are not on good terms with Tanzanians, so I believe this might also be a reason behind these visa refusals."

One of the government officials, who also preferred anonymity, says it doesn't make sense for the UK visa to be processing in Nairobi Kenya while they have fully fledged High Commission in Tanzania.

Source: allAfrica.com: Tanzania Not Happy With UK Visa Processing