Europe agonises over migrants amid xenophobes, racists and anti-refugees

Germany has been universally praised for its great generosity in welcoming desperate Syrian refugees. And with good reason, considering the meanness displayed by her European Union colleagues.

The Germans, it seems, will never be through with paying penance for losing the Second World War.

There is only one catch to this Big Heart story. Statistics show that Germany has an annual deficit of some 500,000 workers.

It will need an infusion of these numbers annually for the next five years to balance its labour force. Like much of Europe, Germany is ageing fast, and its young are not filling the gap fast enough. The median age is about 49 years.

The biggest and most sophisticated economy in Europe was not built without foresight. The 800,000 Middle-Easterners Chancellor Angela Merkel has promised to grant asylum by December will neatly fill up this labour hole.

Far from being overwhelmed by this huge influx, it happens to be just one per cent of Germany’s 80 million population.

The brilliance of the German system is in apprenticeship, which means all those migrants without skills will in a few years’ time be trained to acquire them and thereafter seamlessly fit into the German industrial machine. For Germany, it all boils down to smart pragmatism.

The other reason why Germany is the preferred destination of the migrants is because of the generous welfare benefits it grants to the unemployed.

Only the Scandinavian countries come close to this. The migrants have done their homework before fleeing their home countries. That is why they are heading to these specific countries.

Countries like Britain, which aren’t keen to take in the refugees, see the problem in terms of political risk. Waves of immigrants don’t just tax the economy in their case, they also pose a huge headache of integration, particularly in this case when these are Muslims from a very alien culture.

Besides, extremist political groups like the UK Independence Party are waiting to pounce and ignite xenophobic passions. The same prevails in France, as in many other European Union countries.

The US certainly won’t be taking any significant number of the refugees ­– relative to its size – either. Such is out of the question with the electoral cycle having entered into full swing and the likes of Donald Trump breathing fire against immigrants.

Officially, the US says it will admit – as an “emergency window” – 1,500 Syrians. Then it will add 10,000 more by November next year. It should take more. It is the prime culprit in fanning the chaos and instability in the Middle East through the wars it has been instigating.

Other players who proudly admit to arming all manner of fighting militias in Syria are Saudi Arabia and the rich Gulf statelets of Qatar and UAE. Their intake of Syrian and Iraqi refugees has been a grand zero.

Compared to these countries, tiny Lebanon and Jordan, together with Turkey, have bravely shouldered the biggest burden of those fleeing the Syrian civil war. Between them they host 4 million refugees.

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Who says God cannot be bullied? We can congregate in some shrine, draw in a bevy of loud politicians, and tell Him what we want Him to do.

Who is He not to be arm-twisted? Kwani? Doesn’t He drink mursik? Come on, God must bow down to the Nilotes of the highlands.

They demand no less. Daniel arap Moi brought them up this way. And who the hell is the ICC? Don’t they know we beat the world in the World Athletics championships? Whoever wants our vote must come for our medals first. Sisi ni sisi. The Great Ones.

We can actually go to The Hague and burn down that ICC building. Hoping Fatou Bensouda is consumed by the flames.

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