South Africa Government has described as ‘regrettable’ and ‘sad’ the recent pronouncement by some African countries banning travelers from South Africa from entering their countries due to the concerns over the new COVID-19 variant, Omicron.
According to our Source, Seychelles, Mauritius, Rwanda and Angola have all stopped inbound flights from South Africa in order to ward-off the new variant.
Clayson Monyela, Spokesman for the Foreign Ministry lamented, “It is quite regrettable, very unfortunate, and I will even say sad, to be talking about travel restrictions imposed by a fellow African country.
“What I don’t understand is that some of these African countries that are doing this, know the struggles as a continent we have, where European countries will take this decision and impose travel bans.”
Regretting that SA had in the near past assisted some of the named countries with vaccines, he said, “When a fellow African country does that, especially in the context where most of these countries are beneficiaries… it doesn’t make sense.”
Monyela called on all countries, globally, who have imposed travel restrictions on outbound flights from SA to reverse such nefarious decisions with immediate effect.
Health Minister of South Africa, Joe Phaahla, has also said that it appeared that the country was too hasty in announcing the COVID variant. But he was also certain that if SA had kept quiet, the effects would be too devastating globally.
“But that would have been detrimental, because our approach is for our citizens to not live in false security and false safety,” he said.
Malawi, one of the Southern African countries to suffer from the imposed travel ban, is also lamenting, with the President, Lazarus Chakwera, terming such actions as ‘Afrophobia.’
Azuka Edokobi is a Writer , a Farmer, a Supply Chain Expert and an Entrepreneur