According to the government of the United Kingdom, immigrants from Nigeria are the ones who bring the most relatives.
According to UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman, who was quoted by The Times UK, the government was thinking about tightening the laws governing dependants.
This arose as a result of Home Office immigration statistics revealing an uneven number of people from various countries entering the UK to work and study.
In spite of the fact that Nigerian students made up just 7% of all foreign students during that time, analysis of the Home Office information reveals that Nigerians made up 40% of all relatives who traveled with foreign students in the year leading up to June 2022.
The UK granted study visas to 34,000 Nigerians, who brought with them 31,898 relatives in total. In the year leading up to June, 8,972 Nigerians were granted work visas, and they brought 8,576 relatives with them.
Comparatively, the data reveals that 24,916 relatives were brought to the UK by 93,049 Indian students who arrived there last year, while 114,837 Chinese students brought 401 relatives with them.
“There were 117,965 grants to Indian nationals in the year ending June 2022, an increase of 80,569 (+215%) compared to 2019. Chinese nationals were the second most common nationality granted Sponsored study visas in the year ending June 2022, with 115,056 visas granted, 4% lower than the number seen in 2019 (119,825).”
“In the other top 5 nationalities, Nigerian nationals saw the largest relative increase in Sponsored Study grants compared with 2019, increasing by 57,545 (+686%) to a record high of 65,929, making them the third largest nationality group in the latest year,” Home office said.
According to a Home Office employee who spoke with Daily Mail in a chat session, “This is the highest on record in our time series, with the large increase representing both a recovery from lower numbers during the Covid-19 pandemic and an increase over the pre-pandemic period.”