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Visa rejection rates: Applicants from Africa vs global trends

Staff Writer
Estimated reading time: 2 minutes

The number of applications for Europe’s Schengen Area visas has declined over the years as rejection rates have surged, says Prof. Mehari Taddele Maru from the School of Transnational Governance, European University Institute.

“While restrictive for all applications, the European visa regime is notably more stringent towards African visa applicants than those from other regions,” he said.

African visa applicants face more severe restrictions compared to applicants from other regions, resulting in a disproportionately high rejection rate.

In 2022, Africa topped the list of rejections with 30% or one in three of all processed applications being turned down, even though it had the lowest number of visa applications per capita. This was 12.5% higher than the global average, said Maru.

The rejection rates for African applicants for Schengen visas are generally 10% higher than the global average, three times higher than the highest rejection rate, and 10 times higher than for US-Americans, the professor noted.

Visa rejection data and trends

Globally, the number of Schengen visa applications decreased from 16.7 million in 2014 to 7.6 million in 2022, representing a decline of almost 9 million applications – 54.7%.

The number of Schengen visa applications in Africa decreased from 2.22 million in 2014 to 2.05 million in 2022, a decrease of almost 171,000 applications or 7.7%.

Passport with a large, denied stamp

The rejection rate for Schengen visa applications increased significantly over the same period.

Globally, the total rejection rate surged from 5% to 17.5% in 2022, marking an increase of 12.5%. In Africa, the rejection rate reached 30% over the same period, a 12% increase from the 18% rejection rate in 2014, and nearly twice the global average, said Maru.

“About three in 10 African Schengen visa applicants were rejected, compared to one in 10 applicants worldwide.”

Africa accounted for seven of the top 10 countries with the highest Schengen visa rejection rates in 2022: Algeria (45.8%), Guinea-Bissau (45.2%), Nigeria (45.1%), Ghana (43.6%), Senegal (41.6%), Guinea (40.6%), and Mali (39.9%).

By contrast, only one in twenty-five applicants residing in the US, Canada, or the UK were rejected, and one in ten from Russia.

Notable exceptions are the Seychelles and Mauritius, which along with 61 countries in Latin America and Asia are exempt from the Schengen visa requirement.

A few African countries like South Africa, Botswana, and Namibia face a relatively low rejection rate of less than 7%, said Maru.

According to the professor, the poorer the country of nationality, the higher the rejection rate. Many African countries have low ranking gross national income per capita, and also rank low on the

Henley Passport Index

, which measures the number of destinations a passport holder can enter without a visa.

The overstay claim as grounds for African visa rejections

“Visa rejection is also being used as a condition for the return and readmission of illegal migrants in Europe. Essentially, it punishes African countries whose citizens are found to be illegally residing in Europe, and those with the lowest rate of return and readmission,” said Maru.

Officially, visa rejections are often attributed to doubts about applicants’ intention to leave the destination country before the visa expires. According to European states, most rejections are based on “reasonable doubts about the visa applicants’ intention to return home.”

The possibility of illegal overstay alone cannot account for the significantly higher rejection rates among African applicants. In 2022, Malta, with an alarming 35.5% visa application rejection rate, only had 750 third-country nationals residing in the country without proper authorisation.

“There is no evidence to suggest that a higher rejection rate leads to a decrease in irregular migration or visa overstays,” said Maru.

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