Shadow Migration

More Nigerian families are having their babies in the United States and Europe. This is costing the country hard earned foreign exchange, and is sparking fears of future loss of valuable manpower, writes OBODO EJIRO.

When Mike Ogundipe’s wife was seven and half months pregnant in December 2016, he sold his only car. He had bought the car, a Toyota Camry 2013 model, a year earlier with funds collaboratively raised by himself, his wife and close friends, before his wedding ceremony.

“We had to sell something valuable to fund our ambition of having our baby in the United States,” the 29-year-old property developer and his wife, who works with a newspaper told me in their living room in Surulere, Lagos. 

“Today, my daughter has an American passport and birth certificate, which is a head start,” Mrs Ogundipe cheerfully told me as she revealed that her second child will follow the same path (she is already carrying her second pregnancy).

In the last one and half decade, more middle income families in Nigeria have deemed it a priority to have one or two of their children born in the U.S. or other developed countries in Europe.

In the past, the trend which is also referred to as  “birth tourism” was common with families in high income brackets but as more awareness on travel, cost of trips and other details become readily available, more Nigerians across divides have embraced the trend.

“I can count on my fingers the number of men and women who have come here to fix iteneries to and from the United States for women who are pregnant this week alone,” a ticker at the Lagos office of a Middle Eastern airline told me in confidence. “They prefer our airlines because we offer competitive prices and hotel accommodation for pregnant women and children in transit.”

By the estimate of the ticketer, at least ten visibly pregnant women come to purchase tickets every week. That comes to an average of 40 per month. That number does not cover those whose pregnancies are not visible or those that complete their bookings remotely.

Given that over 10 airlines operate flights out of Nigeria daily, the scale of the movements is enormous. By some estimates, thousands of Nigerian women leave the shores of the country yearly to give birth to children in the U.S., Canada and Europe. The phenomena is so pervasive that one local bank has already crafted a loan product that targets families that are interested in making these journeys.

Over in the U.S., a number of Nigerians have also devised ways of making money out of the whole scheme. They operate unregistered maternity hotels for women who do not have relatives in the country to put up with while expecting their delivery dates.

The maternity hotels offer feeding and accommodation to the pregnant women who often have to wait for three months before their baby arrival dates, arrange for doctors on behalf of women who do not understand the terrain and process documents for the babies once they are born. In some cases, whole houses are devoted to this business as it is very lucrative.

A gathering storm

If Nigeria’s middle and lower class is sold on the importance of “born in America babies,” it is the product of the action of the upper and ruling class. As of today, most of the children of those in the upper and ruling class are born abroad.

In December 2009, Nafisat Yuguda, a daughter of then President Umaru Yar'Adua, was delivered of a baby boy in Maryland in the U.S., a few months earlier her elder sister, Zainab Dakingari also had a baby in the same country. Both women were married to serving state governors. 

In the early hours of September 23, 2015, former President Goodluck Jonathan’s daughter welcomed a baby girl in the United States, while in 2017, the daughter-in-law of former military President Ibrahim Babangida had a baby boy in the same country. At the federal level, under the current administration, President Muhammadu Buhari’s daughter, Zahra Buhari Indimi, had a baby boy in Spain in 2017. 

Apart from the ruling class, many successful business men and women, top civil servants, military personnel and clergy across divides encourage their children to have their kids abroad.

“The trend is being driven by the situation in Nigeria,” says Ikechukwu Kelikume, a don at the Pan Atlantic University. “The country is not making much progress and its image is still not up there yet; so people are seeking alternative passports for their children,” Kelikume, an expert in human economic behaviours says.

“For some families,” says Kelikume, “the move is a precursor to planned migration. But this does not apply to the ruling class who do not have an incentive to abandon Nigeria, except some unexpected shift occurs.” 

“The America passport comes at a high cost,” says Helen Umeh, who had twins in the American state of Washington in May 2017. Estimates for the round trip vary from states to states with more densely populated states in the United States posting higher bills for baby delivery.

What a golden chid cost

On average, a woman who goes to have a baby in the United States has to have at least N6million to cover the cost of transportation, feeding, accommodation and the medical bill. If there are complications during child birth, the medical bill could be double what was budgeted.

I interviewed several women who have undergone the process and they revealed that on average, normal birth in a birth center (not hospital) costs about $3,500 (N1.3million) per child. A normal birth at a hospital could cost as much as $7,500 (N2.8million). However, if there are complications in the process of having the baby, additional fees of up to $2000-$10,000 (N730,000 –N3.7million) could apply depending on the severity of the complications.

In the case of a Caesarean Sections, the patient could pay as much as $20,000 (N7.2million) depending on how complex the medical procedures the doctors have to engage in are. For most Nigerians, cash payments are made, unlike American patients who pay piece meal and spread their payments over several years. 

All of these foreign exchange is pulled from the meagre foreign exchange which Nigeria gets from crude oil sale and foreign remittances from Nigerians living in the United States.

It is estimated that Nigerians spend at least $73.4million annually on birth tourism alone. These are funds that could as well go into the accumulation of capital assets that could lift millions out of poverty.

“For a country desperate for foreign exchange for national development, this abnormally high expenditure puts pressure on the nation’s reserves,” says Dr Bongo Adi, an economist with the Lagos Business School. These funds could have contributed to the stock of capital in Nigeria if they were expended on the import of machines and other materials that can be used to further develop Nigeria.” In the end according to Dr Adi, citizens of a poor country are enriching doctors and other professionals of developed countries.

“There are affordable hospitals in Nigeria that can offer fantastic services at a quarter of the price which is charged by hospitals in the United States, says Kelikume.” 

But Mrs. Udoh who had twins in the U.S. thinks otherwise. “I had always dreamed of having an American born child,” she says. First, the quality of health care is different. When you have your baby at a hospital in Nigeria, some of the nurses are so sarcastic, especially in government owned hospitals. In the United States the story is different, they actually treat you like a queen over there. They are also better equipped to handle all sort of emergencies.

According to Mrs Udoh, “American law is the second reason many Nigerian women are making the journey.” Under America’s fourteenth amendment, “all persons born or naturalized in the United States…are citizens of the United States.” 

The families shelling out millions of naira to get citizenship for their children know that American citizenship comes with a lot of pecks: free access to the U.S., access to American education and health care and the prestige of being American. “Who wouldn’t want that for their children if they could afford it,” Mrs Udoh asks me leaning forward from her chair as if she was challenging me to give an answer that defeats hers.

“So when I was told I was carrying twins I said to myself we have killed two birds with one stone” she said. “Of course we couldn’t afford to pay the bill at once, so we set up a plan with the hospital to pay up in the next five years.

 For some Nigerian women the story is different, the bolt from the hospital to avoid payment. Beyond money the new crop of American born Nigerian babies is leaving a concern.

to be continued