According to the Webster dictionary, an expatriate is simply a person living in a foreign country.  In a more progressive view, I will say an expatriate is a person who is living in a foreign country that is more advanced economically, politically, and technologically than his native country, and the citizen is making a legal and respectable living by the current standard of that advanced nation.  The purpose of an expatriate is to return to his or her country to lead or help channel the development of the country towards the standard of the advanced country, where training and experience was received, in a quicker and more adaptable manner.  An expatriate is basically a legalized harmless spy who goes to a more advanced nation to acquire their skills, knowledge, experience, education, and technical-know-how in order to help place his or her nation at the table of nations respectably over a short period of time (not repeating the initial or developing mistakes of the advanced nation) .  The benefit of an expatriate is not necessary to get rich, but to first increase the respect and economic relevance of the nation to the world, even though wealth may come later.  This means that every developing nation must invest in their citizens and their children in advanced nations, even if they have to sponsor their education, provide agents that help them find respectable jobs, sponsor legal teams to assist with immigration problems and discrimination, provide training for their sports people (global ambassadors of success), and most importantly, open their businesses and franchises on foreign soil to return revenues in foreign currency. 

Nigeria must understand that money (paper, coins, or cowries) does not really exist.  It is a man made representation to measure the value of a man or society at a particular time and in a particular location.   According to my book titled “Living with a peace of mind”, the value of a man is actually how much knowledge he has acquired to serve his community in order to increase the health, happiness, and peace of mind for himself and the community.  In a civilized, living, and advanced society, such a man is wealthy not necessary because he serves, but because others are willing to compensate him financially so that he can be free from the worries of want and have excess time to continue serving their children with his knowledge.  Such a country or community continues to thrive because their children soon understand that the true wealth that comes from God is not the billions you possess (which could be blood or stolen money), but what others are willing to give you based on the value of who you are and how that value increases the well being of the entire community and nation.   

According to “Living with a peace of mind”, an expatriate usually leaves his or her homeland to increase his value as a person.   He or she goes to the advanced nation or sneaks to a different nation with the hope of finding a better opportunity that will make him or her more valuable as a person in order to provide a service or product that the society needs.  It is the exchange of man made money for productive service or product of value we produce that helps to measure the true value of our spiritual and physical being.  This rule only applies as long as your service or product will not lead to the destruction, restriction, or bad health of another.  A country where the valuable people, who have acquired skills, knowledge, education, and technical-know-how, are unemployed or have no opportunity to serve their community because of their gender, ethnicity, or stolen resources, is a dying nation.  If all that actually have money are the illiterates and valueless people by the economic standard of the advanced nations, then that is a nation without expatriates.  An expatriate does not only go to a foreign land, but usually visits, eventually returns, or service his or her nation through direct and indirect contributions.  Many even make their nations proud and recognized on foreign shores.  An expatriate may never return, but the descendants will.  A nation, where the valueless rules because they think they have the paper money or will die to have it, will not only lose that money to more advanced nations, but also, their supposed expatriates may never return and may never be able to convince their children to return.  A living nation attracts and keeps the valuables of other nations, but a dying nation can not even prevent its citizens from leaving. 

On August 19, 2008, I got a message from my wife, who is Yoruba, that there was a “Jobs in Nigeria Exhibition” (JINE) in Atlanta from August 19 to 20, and after that, they would be moving to Houston.  JINE was basically looking for Nigerian expatriates to take to Nigeria, and I have been hearing that Banks and Oil companies usually give our expatriates better pay, car with a driver, and descent housing, just to make life comfortable after returning to Nigeria from an advanced country.   I did not give my boss enough notice, and I did not want to go for the second day of the exhibition because Nigerians (JINE) might just decide that the first day was good enough and will not honor the next day as advertised on the website.   With a half-hearted approval from my boss, I left for the job fair.  I did not have a suit on and my house was on the other side of town, so I decided to go there just to have a feel of things.  If I had to go put on a suit, if they were long lines of people, if they were many companies, then I would have to call my boss and inform her that I was taking the rest of the day off.  When I got there, I saw some with suits and others without.  Obviously, the later just found out that day like I did too.   

I walked in, turned in my resume, and took a seat.  There were only two companies, UBA and Assets Resources Management.  There were also old friends at the place, so we talked a little.  Many were there for about two hour waiting for their turn to be interviewed by both companies and some by a second company.    About 15 minutes after I enter, a man from the UBA table approached me, greeted me, introduced himself, and asked the origin of my name.  I told him it was from Edo State.  He then joked with me by saying “Omo no Oba”, and we both laughed.  About another 10 minutes later, a man by the name of Shola Ajani, who appeared to be the coordinator of JINE came in and called my name.  Unlike others who were asked to follow JINE representatives to the next room for the interview, Mr. Ajani called my name but came to sit beside me.  In a low tone, he told me that my resume was great, but that they were only interviewing accounting and finance people for Lagos, and he promised to keep my resume in their database for other companies who needed IT and business development people.  He was actually a very nice guy and he wrote his information on my paper because he was out of business cards.   

On my way out, I stopped by to say goodbye to my Yoruba friends and head back to work.  It was then that I got the shock of my life in the USA.  My friends were surprised that I was leaving just after 30 minutes of entrance.  I explained to them that Mr. Ajani of JINE just told me that there were here for accounting and finance people.  It was then that I found out that Kunle, who also had IT background, was waiting for his second interview, and the Yoruba wife of my Yoruba soccer teammate, who also was IT, was told to wait for her interview.  I did not make a big deal about it because my spirit already rejected the interview.  Even if I fought them to get interviewed, what make me think that they will even contact me later?  I then told my Yoruba friends that maybe it was a WAZOBIA thing, and they laughed.  They did not laugh to put me down, they laughed because it is a normal Nigerian practice and tradition.  The other woman with them even said, maybe they are only looking for Yorubas (it was a friendly, acceptable, and innocent statement).  I genuinely wished my friends the very best in their interviews and I left.  As I was leaving, even one of my former pastors, who is also Yoruba, was surprised to see me leaving, but I only told her what Mr. Ajani told me.  I called my Yoruba wife as I was leaving the building from my cell, and she was so angry that she promised to go there the next day to start World War III.  I had to beg her to let it be, but reminded her that this is the WAZOBIA system that has crippled Nigeria from becoming the economic and political giant it is supposed to be in the global community.  For years, I have written and talked to my Yoruba friends, wife, and in-laws about the evil of WAZOBIA on Nigeria, but they usually dismissed it out of ignorance.  Now, many are turning around because of this experience and what they have seen from the Olympics and the Nigerian soccer house. 

Does Nigeria want expatriates or not? If they do, does it have to be mainly WAZOBIA for just Lagos and maybe for all the branches in Nigeria?  After all our rich pre-colonial culture and everlasting folktales of putting quality over quantity and wisdom before strength, WAZOBIA still extended its evil hand into the most advanced, freest, and most civilized country in the world to promote TRIBALISM in the name of expatriates.  Is this not a contradiction?  The expatriates that are suppose to be demolishing WAZOBIA and TRIBALISM based on the power of diversity that makes advanced nations great are now being recruited by the ONLY EVIL that has relegated Nigeria to the background – WAZOBIA.  The United States in its advancement and sophistication have realized that change is necessary for progress.  They are even demanding that it is time to have a Black/African (Barack Obama) and a woman (Hillary Clinton) as the leader of the free world, but Nigeria is still practicing WAZOBIA, the illegitimate child of colonization and the Devil itself, on American soil.  The children of WAZOBIA must speak against and kill WAZOBIA, or the Niger-Delta issue will ultimately be the foundation that will split us into many countries.  I am assuming that the descendants of WAZOBIA even care.  

(WAZOBIA does not necessary mean Yoruba, Hausa, or Igbo; it is simply a justified EVIL system of discrimination in Nigeria that favors them against the genuine progress, happiness, and freedom of the Nigerian nation at the expense of the Southerners - Niger-Delta, who produce 90% of Nigeria’s revenue)