How to turn migration into opportunity

Moving beyond securitisation to holistic strategies

- ADEOYE 0. AKINOLA

BY THE end of 2024, the world had reached a sobering migration milestone. According to the United Nations Refugee Agency, 43.7 million people were officially registered as refugees, while 123.2 million were forcibly displaced: equivalent to one in every 67 people on earth.

International migration overall climbed to 304 million. Among them were Europeans, Africans, and indeed, many of us who move, live, and work across borders. Migration, after all, is not an anomaly but part of human nature.

Yet, migration often turns tragic. On October 3, 2013, the world watched in horror as at least 365 migrants drowned off the coast of Lampedusa, Italy, after their overcrowded boat caught fire. The African Union (AU) declared November 3 a day of mourning, and former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon called for a global framework to prevent such tragedies.

That call eventually led to the drafting of the UN Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration in 2018. Since then, migration has become a defining axis of Africa-Europe relations. No longer confined to humanitarian headlines, it now shapes diplomatic negotiations, development aid, counterterrorism strategies, climate governance, and debates over Africa's demographic transition. At its core, migration is both a political flashpoint and a development question — central to how the EU and Africa understand one another, and themselves.