Why i fell out of love with the UK

As a young man i moved to the UK in the 90s to study at a university in the north.
I was a naive, culture shocked African immigrant who was pleased to be in the land of Tom Paine and Shakespeare. I was looking forward to observing how a liberal democratic country functioned and taking my ideas back home which was under a brutal dictatorship.
The impression i had overseas of the UK was a country that was welcoming, tolerant, liberal, not corrupt and believed in fair play.

More than a decade has passed since i first moved here and, how times have changed. The euphoria that greeted the electoral triumph of new labour on that sunny day in 1997 has evaporated. The tories were sleazy, and the country needed a change. How naive i was!
The new labour project began to unravel and Tony Blair's interventionist policy- Kosovo was his first intervention- was a sign of things to come. Along the way, Pinochet was arrested for his crimes against humanity after seizing power in chile, in London. Perhaps that was new labour's greatest triumph with regard to human rights.

Since then, Sierra Leone( where conflict is on the horizon, again), AFghanistan and Iraq have been invaded by British troops. So much for respecting international law.
It's not just foreign policy, the assault on civil liberties: ID cards, internment, CCTV, mental health bill, ASBOs, DNA database, have made me reach the conclusion that Britain is a police state bent on monitoring its citizens just like the stasi did in east Germany.

Tony Blair famously said ' Africa is a scar on the conscience of the world' . Hardly anybody would disagree that the beautiful continent has been raped and pillaged by western countries and institutions, and fellow African countries recently.
Blair missed his calling as a thespian. He openly supports dictatorships if they ptotect British investment and corporations in Africa. He deports refugees to Congo, Sudan and Zimbabwe whilst criticising their human rights atrocities. He talks about poverty reduction in Africa whilst refusing to cancel the debts of Africa unless they submit to his privatisation agenda.
The Blair government also sold weapons to Indonesia while it was repressing eastTimorese, the Israelis who use their weapons indiscriminately in the occupied territories etc.

Blair recently told black communities that our culture was responsible for the shootings and stabbings which have blighted our young men in London. This is the same man who relies upon black voters 78% of who vote labour, to help him win elections in mostly urban areas. This man has done nothing for black communities in this country and overseas.

Finally, the debate surrounding immigration - which i write regularly about- is disturbing. Liam Byrne ( wonder ehere the name is from?) said yesterday that immigration was damaging certain communitiesin this country. The reason we have economic migrants is because their industries in the developing world have been destroyed by the SAPs dictated to them by the Bretton Wood institutions. Dumping, civil service and public sectorredundancies, privatisation of parastatals, agricultural subsidies result in poverty in the sounther countries. The reason people move here is to escape poverty and seek a slice of the wealth that is inaccessible to them in their countries.
Another reason people come here is to escape persecution. War, genocide and ethnic cleansing e.g. in Iraq, where 2 million people have fled a civil war which resulted from the occupation by coalition forces. These Iraqis are fleeing death squads, IEDs, occupation forces etc. Upon arrival to the UK, the government has deemed Iraq safe to return home. It's bad enough that we bombed the shit out of their country resulting in a death toll of up to 600,000, we then refuse to offer them a safe haven when its patently clear from any news broadcast that Iraq is a dangerous country.

Another factor to take into account is the DNA database which holds samples of 40% of black men in the UK. DNA samples are taken when a suspect is arrested according to the relevant legislation. This practice has led to samples being taken from people who are later released without charge, acquited or even from children. Blair says it has solved rapes, murders and other serious crimes. While i have no doubt it has helped solve some crimes, i wonder how many rapists and murderers there are among children who have samples take from them.
What is the agenda behind DNA samples of a large proportion of black males in this country?
This government cannot be trusted with anything.

I have now advised students from my home country wishing to study here or, people wishing to work here to avoid the UK. For reasons given above and in previous posts, i think is at best hostile, at worst racist to immigrants.
I am now considering moving back to my home country, i'm not going to be here when they start handing out yellow stars in the future. I will take with me stories of a country where i met many wonderful people, a beautiful country and many other wonderful things about the UK. I am going to urge students wanting to study here to consider cheaper alternatives e.g. Australia or Canada. This country takes immigrants for granted; you just have to read the comments on BBC have your say or listen to radio to understand the hatred.

I never thought the journey would end like this but, c'est la vie.