CEE Changes

In 1993, John Godson was a Nigerian college student looking to do missionary work abroad. Through various connections he made with ministers and missionaries from around the world, he ended up moving to Poland, making him just one of a few thousand Africans in the entire country.

Seventeen years later, he became Poland’s first-ever black member of Parliament, earning the nickname, “The Polish Obama,” for his ground-breaking election in December 2010. A vocal advocate for African migrants in Central and Eastern Europe, Godson was recently in Prague to serve as a panelist at an Anglo-American University event on the migrant experience in Central Europe. Shortly before the start of the panel discussion, and fresh off a plane from Warsaw, he sat down with The Prague Post to discuss his own experiences, as well as his thoughts on Europe’s need for a comprehensive immigration policy. This is the extended interview with Godson. An abbreviated version will be available online later this week.

The Pratue Post: In your experiences, are European countries open and welcoming to migrants?

John Godson: I don’t have good news. I would be expecting the countries that have had experience working with migrants would lead the way in formulating a pan-European policy on immigration. Poland doesn’t have that experience. Maybe pre-war Poland had some experience with the Jews, for instance. But post-war Poland is more or less homogeneous and most of the migrants are Russian, Belarusian, Ukrainian and those aren’t the kind of immigrants we’re talking about. I think that’s one of the major issues facing Poland in the near future and hopefully my experience will come in handy.

PP: If we’re speaking solely about the African migrant experience in Central Europe, what can you tell me about it?

JG: My experience has been very positive. Maybe in the beginning I had the conviction that there was racism. And most Africans think that way. But once you get to see and meet Polish people you get to realize that they are wonderful, hospitable, friendly people. That has helped me to redress my attitude. I think what happens in Poland and other parts of Central and Eastern Europe is what I call low intercultural competence. Basically, out of the fact that when you didn’t have the chance of meeting people from other cultures, you judge them based on stereotypes and fear. But the more you get to know them the more you appreciate and understand them for who they are.

At the beginning I was beaten up twice, but it’s been 18 years, now. I got involved in politics in 2004 …

PP: How long had you been in the country at that point?

JG: I came to Poland in 1993 so I guess it was 11 years. I started at the lowest level – the district council. That’s actually where the real thing happens. It’s for people who are locals, who are really part of a community.

PP: Now, was this an area where there are other African immigrants like yourself?

JG: Not at all. I was the only one in my district.

PP: So you weren’t ‘the African candidate from the African district’ who got elected…

JG: Right. I was the only one from Africa. In 2006 I ran for city council and didn’t get elected but I ran again in 2008 and I won. In 2010 we had another election and I got the second largest vote in all of Ludz. So I’d say a lot has changed.

PP: How do you mean?

JG: In the first place, just to think of an African being a counselor is something that nobody could fathom. I remember when I got involved even in the district council the media attention it brought.

PP: Just the fact that you were running was probably a matter of national interest.

JG: Well, there was definitely attention when I was running, but when I got elected with the highest number of votes in my district that was really something. So in that sense, seeing a non-Polish-born immigrant getting involved in politics at the very grassroots level was something you can really point to and say things are changing. We’ve heard about migrants who have been counselors but in very small towns, because they’re a medical doctor or something like that. But in a large city, that was the first time it happened.

PP: How do you hope to use your position in Parliament to improve or address Polish attitudes toward immigrants and aiding the assimilation process going forward?

JG: Before I became an MP I was the founder of the African Institute which promotes relations between Poland and Africa. I’m also on the advisory committee to the minister responsible for equality. As an MP I get involved in various issues that have to do with tolerance. There are a number of things happening, but it’s not just a matter of activities, I think it’s a matter of people erasing stereotypes. The stereotypes people have of Nigerians, for instance, is very negative. When people think about Africa they think about poverty. They think about conflict and corruption. They think about sickness and disease. So when they get to meet an African who is different, who is conscientious, who has integrity – that’s something that really confronts the stereotypes they have. That’s one of the ways I see my role, here. To be a reason for people to confront those stereotypes by simply being a good example.

PP: What is the biggest concern migrants – African migrants, specifically – have when they move to this part of the world?

JG: When you come into a homogeneous society where people are not used to having someone from, say, India or Kenya – people who don’t look like them – the reaction is one of fear or isolation on the part of the migrant. I think what has to change is simply the locals – the Polish people or Eastern European people – getting to know these people from different cultures who look differently from them as their neighbors. To see their kids going to the same school. Once that changes, that low-intercultural competence won’t be there anymore.

PP: But what needs to be done to insure that changes?

JG: I’m actually writing my doctoral research on cultural adaptations of Africans in Poland. And I belive one of the things that has to change is there should be a coherent policy of assimilating and integrating foreigners. Most of them come in as students and right away there is a problem because the immigrant students are living in separate hostels from Polish students. So the isolation is there from the very beginning. And so the migrants socialize among themselves and aren’t meeting with the locals. So we need a coherent policy that right from the beginning. Many of the foreigners who come in say they were expecting someone to pick them up from the airport and there was no one there, so they had to take a taxi and pay money to travel to the university. Also, they’d find out there was no orientation week or anything to get them acclimated. Most universities in the west you organize an orientation month or week where students are taught cultural issues, where the classes are, where to shop, all of those administrative things that go along with being a student. Our policy needs to at least help expose these foreigners to local culture and also expose the local people to them. And that’s one of the things we’re doing in the African Institute. We cooperate with a number of schools already to arrange for there to be a one-week orientation to help them get indoctrinated.

PP: Are the majority of Africans living in Poland intellectuals?

JG: I would say yes. In the last few years that is changing, though. There are now those who are coming in to do business. And I don’t mean big business, I mean selling their products in the big cities, especially in Warsaw.

PP: So this isn’t the old story of people leaving a difficult homeland in order to find a better life, then. These are people who are going out into the world to make a difference and maybe to learn things to bring back to their homeland.

JG: Most of the Africans who leave Africa to travel to the west are economic migrants. They’re leaving to get out of a bad situation and look for something better. But most of the Africans who are coming to places like Poland or other countries in Central and Eastern Europe, they’re not economic migrants. These are people who have scholarships or who have a rich family and they can come here and pay for their studies. They come to Poland, for instance, to study at the medical university in Ludz. They have 350 foreign students there and those students pay about 12,000 euros a year, which is a lot in Poland, where education is free. Most economic migrants go to the west because it’s easier and there are already a lot more of them there. Also they don’t have to learn the language. When you come to Poland or the Czech Republic or Hungary, you have to learn the language.

PP: How many of them stay?

JG: Most don’t. Most want to return to their countries. Many end up going to the west and go to the U.S. or the U.K. Those who stay are people who got involved with something, getting married for instance, something that makes them feel, “This is now my home.”

PP: Did you get married? Is that why you’re still there?

JG: I did get married, yes. We have two children, two boys, two girls aged 6 to 16. So yes, this is now my home.

PP: What originally brought you to Poland?

JG: I came as a missionary, and this was right after the fall of communism. While I was in my second year at university (in Nigeria) I cot in touch with [Romanian pastor and famed anti-communist prisoner] Richard Wurmbrand, who was living in the U.S. at the time. He used to send me these magazine articles about what was happening in Eastern Europe. This was in the late 1980s. One of the stories talked about this young man named Ivan who was killed by the KGB in the Soviet Union. He was killed because of his faith. I remember reading the story and seeing the photograph of his body lying there and I started crying and I told God right then that I wanted to replace Ivan. So that was how it started. I graduated in 1992 and started applying to a number of organizations. One of them, IFES [International Fellowship of Evangelical Studies], gave me three countries to choose from – Poland, Russia and Hungary. And I chose Poland.

PP: Any particular reasons?

JG: Yes, there were pragmatic reasons, of course. Number one, when I got that offer, I received a letter from a Scottish missionary who encouraged me to choose Poland. Secondly, when you come as a missionary you need to raise your own financial support from home and he told me there was a contract for me teaching English if I wanted it. So for me that made it an easy decision.

PP: And you say when you got there you were beaten up twice?

JG: Yes. The first time was on the 23rd of December 1993 and I was coming out of a shop and these there boys came up to me and asked me “What are you doing here?” And I didn’t understand what they were saying and I just smiled at them and said “Nie rozumiem” which means, “I don’t understand.” Then, one of them spit at me and another one tried to stuff a cigarette in my eye and the third one hit me and they just walked away. That was the first time. The second time I was visiting a smaller town near the border of Germany and I was waiting for my hosts and these three young men walked past me and one of them came back and hit me and just walked away. Those were the only two incidents where I was physically assaulted.

PP: With so few Africans living in Poland, where does that level of hatred even come from?

JG: They watch TV, they see movies, just like you. There are Polish jokes that talk about “murzyn,” which means “negro.” So those stereotypes are out there. Most of the young students who come to Poland get angry and saddened when they are called murzyn. And I tell them “No, it’s okay. I’m a murzyn and i’m proud of that. I don’t want people to change the nomenclature, what I want to change is the attitude behind that nomenclature. You know, we are the guests. I believe, you know, that guests should submit th emselves to the culture that is prevalent in a particular place and not try to change it. And by your example and by your behavior you can prove whether that stereotype is right or wrong. Not by protesting.

PP: Maybe by getting elected to Parliament.

JG: (Laughs) I don’t expect everyone to do what I did.

PP: You married a Polish woman. Did that cause any problems?

JG: From her family, no. There were definitely friends of hers who were advising her against marrying me. They would tell her, “You know those Africans … they come and they go…” But marrying her also helped me a lot in getting assimilated. Especially in terms of language. She didn’t speak English and I didn’t speak Polish and we had to communicate. So that was crash training, right there.

PP: One of the components of the African Institute that you highlighted was improving relations between African nations and Poland. What is the level of engagement between Poland and Africa right now?

JG: It’s very minimal. And that’s one of my priorities as an MP. Trade relations are improving and increasing, but they’re still very minimal. At the trade level, one of the Polish companies got a contract in Nigeria for one billion euros. That’s a big step. Last week one of the richest men in Poland announced he was investing in an oil field in Nigeria. These things are encouraging, but there aren’t enough of them. Another area that is very important is education. I think Poland can gain a lot by opening up its market to African students. Great Britain last year made something like 70 billion pounds from African students. Why not create tailor-made programs in Poland just for African students? Poland is present, though, in the area of humanitarian aid. There are a number of Polish Catholic missionaries doing wonderful, wonderful work in Africa and there are Polish charities doing great work in the Sudan digging wells.

PP: Are these volunteer programs and NGOs, though, or are they state-funded humanitarian groups down there?

JG: There are a number of state grants that go toward organizations that deal solely with African huminatarian aid. NGOs can make use of these grants. But this is one of the things that is hurting the relations between Africa and the west, or especially in Poland or Central and Eastern Europe.

PP: Hurting relations?

JG: Yes. Especially in Central and Eastern Europe. We look at Africa as a problem. They need help, they need our money and so on. And this can be patronizing. We should look at Africa as a continent of potential or a continent of opportunity. It’s where you can do business, it’s where you can make money. The U.S. Is there. Russia is there. China is there. Germany is there. Great Britain is there. But I’d like to see Poland and its other neighbors there, as well.

PP: As a whole, is Europe open to migrants? This is a big issue right now and it’s something that is going to have to be confronted. Today it may be about immigrants from North Africa, but tomorrow it could be about Nigeria or the Sudan or somewhere we’re not even considering yet.

JG: You know, in the past centuries, Europe has been known as a continent that has exported migrants. They’ve gone all over the world. In Australia, for instance, the indigenous people there are almost no longer in existance, largely because of migrants from Europe. Same in the United States. Same in South America and South Africa. So I think it’s hypocritical to have been exporting immigrants for these hundreds of years and now trying to protect their own borders. I don’t want to play the blame game, but so many of the problems that exist in Africa are the result of European policies – think about colonialism, for instance. There was a UN report released recently that said Europe will need, by 2050, over 100 million immigrants in order to maintain it’s current level of wealth. If they don’t do that, that means in places like Great Britain and other western European countries, people will be working until they are 75 years old. This needs to be addressed. Not having a coherent immigration policy for Europe is actually, in itself, a policy. It’s asking for trouble. Europe needs to be more proactive in attracting the best minds. I know it’s a volatile subject, but we can’t run away from it.

PP: Will what is going on in North Africa right now force the issue?

JG: Yes, but the thing is, I don’t want to see the situation in North Africa to influence any policies made now. This is just a short-term problem. We should be looking at strategic planning, long term. We need to ask ourselves what we want Europe to look like in 2015 or 2020 or 2050.

PP: So are you saying you’re afraid that the unrest in North Africa will get people talking about immigration, but just not in the right way?

JG: Yes. It’s myopic thinking.