At the World Athletic Championships, just three hours before the 100m sprint was going to begin, Africa’s fastest man, Ferdinand Omanyala, was just arriving in the US because of a delayed visa. What’s strange was that his teammates’ visas arrived promptly compared to his visa’s delayed arrival time.
When the US embassy was asked about why the visa took so long, they responded that “we cannot discuss the details of individual visa cases.” To this, Kenya launched a probe into the circumstances behind the delay in Omanyala’s visa. Kenyan sports officials also announced that Omanyala left out some crucial information in his visa application.
Omanyala’s manager doesn’t seem to agree when he said that “As far as I know the whole team went to the embassy at the same time. Ferdinand is accustomed to the process and definitely knows the implications of leaving out information. So I doubt it.”
This is not the sole example of US visa problems. Some residents have trouble getting into the US, but the biggest problem is with Africans, where the delay could be anywhere from 6-8 months. When estimating how long it would take for people in Nairobi to get a visa, the number was 687 days or 3.5 times longer than it would take for a person in London to get one.
The student visa wait time is even worse, as Dennis Kiogora, a founder of the Kenya Airlift Program, stated that most students in his program could not secure visas ahead of a September start date. People like Ferdinand hope that in the future the US will learn from its mistakes and give outsiders visas faster.
When the US embassy was asked about why the visa took so long, they responded that “we cannot discuss the details of individual visa cases.” To this, Kenya launched a probe into the circumstances behind the delay in Omanyala’s visa. Kenyan sports officials also announced that Omanyala left out some crucial information in his visa application.
Omanyala’s manager doesn’t seem to agree when he said that “As far as I know the whole team went to the embassy at the same time. Ferdinand is accustomed to the process and definitely knows the implications of leaving out information. So I doubt it.”
This is not the sole example of US visa problems. Some residents have trouble getting into the US, but the biggest problem is with Africans, where the delay could be anywhere from 6-8 months. When estimating how long it would take for people in Nairobi to get a visa, the number was 687 days or 3.5 times longer than it would take for a person in London to get one.
The student visa wait time is even worse, as Dennis Kiogora, a founder of the Kenya Airlift Program, stated that most students in his program could not secure visas ahead of a September start date. People like Ferdinand hope that in the future the US will learn from its mistakes and give outsiders visas faster.
