I haven’t looked at any statistics to verify this, but my gut feeling is that the Brexit is one of the single most talked about topics over the past few days, which of course is a bit of a no-brainer. But ask some other people and they will say, as a Nigerian, why does the Brexit concern me? And that is a question that I will not answer in this write up other than by saying, I am a global citizen and if you are too, it should concern you.
Another thing I won’t really go into is this whole Article 50 business – mostly because I haven’t taken the time to understand it thoroughly, but also because this is a common sense take and not a technical, legal breakdown. The operating assumptions (there I go talking like a banker) for this write up are as follows:
- To have entered the EU, it is safe to assume that the UK felt the benefits would outweigh the drawbacks
- While seemingly coerced, the UK did NOT have to join the EU, though the cost of not joining, as appears to be the case presently, may have been very costly
- Divorces, as this Brexit has been likened, are emotive and chaotic
- As divorces go, after 43 years, this one will be bloody and downright messy
As it stands
You’re in the EU now (well, up until we see how Parliament reacts and how Brussels wishes to proceed), for better or worse. Most people from the older generations will tell you that marriage is tough, marriage is exhausting, but you stay in and fix it, not run away. Ironic given the voting patterns and the fact that it’s the younger generation that wanted to stay in the EU and tough it out…
And who is your new ‘spouse’, so to speak?
Whether leaving the EU is ultimately wrong or right, let’s take a look at the new partner. Your choice to leave the EU is yours, but the big issue beyond that is who you chose to ride off into the sunset with: the magnificent trio of Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, and Nigel Farage.
Let’s allow that to sink in for a second.
You’ve got a flamboyant, flip-flopping former Mayor of London, with the most ridiculous mop of hair this side of the Atlantic, who joined up with a xenophobic and opportunistic UKIP party leader who had no problem making promises he had no qualms breaking a mere 24 hours later. Michael Gove, I don’t know much about to be honest, but as the saying goes “show me your friends…”
Fear and Loathing
That these politicians lied to their voter base is no new phenomenon. Neither is the fact that they played on their insecurities to galvanize the base, after all, Goering at the Nuremberg trials prescribed that tactic as a surefire way to “bring the people to the bidding of the leaders”. What I find truly despicable is that they preyed on the poor working class that they claimed to stand for, by exaggerating xenophobic fears of the ‘other’ and promising to give them their country back. As if it was stolen in the first place.
To quote one of the most fantastic fictional characters in film, Yoda tells Luke Skywalker:
“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”
The sad part, for these ignorant masses, is that they probably took their already resident fears of Blacks, Asians and Arabs and superimposed them on the immigrants that are apparently ‘taking their jobs’, those coming mostly from eastern Europe. Well then, you’ve locked out ‘the immigrants’ but to my understanding, a Brexit has nothing to do with immigrants coming from other parts of the world outside of Europe, so what now? I mean, a post-Brexit UK could tighten immigration laws and lock out more non-European immigrants (mostly from Commonwealth countries), but is that really going to solve your problems, Dear Working Class?
No. Neither is killing Jo Cox, which absolutely broke my heart. Nigel Farage wasn’t even decent enough to acknowledge the poor woman. So classy.
To paraphrase John Barnes, legendary Liverpool player, the issues are with Labour laws, not immigration laws, as regards jobs being taken from the British. That is, if existing labour laws did not make it so damn cheap to hire immigrants and raised wages to the kind of living wages the Brits are accustomed to, then jobs wouldn’t be stolen. But that’s something you take up with your MPs (please don’t kill any more), not the guys in Brussels. Having said that, how many of these claimants are actually out there actively looking for jobs and are not able to find them? How many of them find it easier to just apply for aid rather than job hunt?
Just a few innocent questions.
What have EU done for me lately?
To hear it told from the average Leave voter, the UK had been giving and giving, and the EU gave nothing back. Easy mate, it can’t have been all that bad. From what I understand, there are a number of monetary and non-monetary benefits that being in the EU brought to the table. Why else would the marriage have lasted 43 years, especially if the issues have been there for so many years? The year 2000 would have been a good a year as any in my opinion…Or the year after, or the next…. you get my drift. If you’re so inclined, kindly Google the benefits to both sides, I bet they aren’t as one-sided as the Brexit proponents suggest.
When Partners have their own personal issues to work through
Make no mistake, the UK itself is a fractured country and has a lot of work it needs to do on itself. This is akin to when people in relationships need to work on themselves in order to be better partners. Scotland and Northern Ireland aren’t fans of this Brexit, which really calls into question which UK people are referring to when they say “oh the UK economy will bounce back, just you wait and see.” What I mean is, are you thinking of a UK as is, or one where Scotland and Northern Ireland say “Cheerio, we’ll throw our lot in with the French and Germans and them lot.”
The EU is not perfect; no one is saying that at all. And one does have to feel a bit sorry for UK farmers, but I also understand that a significant percentage of their exported produce is subsidized by the EU, but that’s technical talk. My point here is, let us not pretend that the UK is the net loser and they are being taken advantage of. Yes, there are problems, but is the solution, given the benefits the UK gains from the EU, to leave the EU wholesale? Or is it to get back in there and continue to fight to get what you so desperately need.
I suppose time will tell.
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