I've been sharing my experience as an African in Web3 and I started sharing that from the first week of this month. We are already in the final week of the month and this will be the final part of this four-part series that I'm sharing with you all. Feel free to check my page for the previous parts of this series. Now, let's get into the final part;

Web3 Has Been A Blessing For Me

I'm being very honest when I say this and I get emotional when I think back to how the journey started for me, all the things I had to sacrifice, the struggles I had to go through while trying to adopt Web3 and all the benefits I've been enjoying since I got into Web3. I've grown so much in character and in learning after coming across so many people from different parts of the world while thriving on Web3.

One of the things I always look back on with pride while thinking of my adventure into Web3 is the amount of connection I've been able to build in Web3. I have gained the experience of interacting and working closely with people from California, South Africa, Canada, England, Pakistan, Indians, the Philippines, and even Korea. Working closely with people from another part of the world is likely something that wouldn't have been very easy to achieve if I was still in the banking sector.

Can you believe that I even started nursing the idea of stepping out of my Country and Africa as a whole in search of greener pastures in other part of the world? I currently don't have the finances to pursue that, but God connected me to people in Web3 who have been very helpful in guiding me through this. I started dreaming of what the experience would be like and I've tried a couple of times to secure a Visa to a couple of places in America. That's when I realized that pursuing those things as an African isn't an easy thing to do.

The truth is that a lot of the problems we Africans are facing as people in Web3 are because of the sort of people we have in our Government. Now, we will be looking at how government affects the experience we Africans get in Web3.

Nigerian Government is unreceptive to Web3.

Ever since I got into Cryptocurrency, Blockchain, and Web3 as a whole, all the policies that my Country's government has been making towards cryptocurrency have been very unreceptive. They paint an agenda that makes it seem like Web3 and Crypto is the hotspot for fraudsters who use them to commit malicious acts. Back in 2021, it was openly declared in Nigeria that anyone who is connected to Cryptocurrency should be treated as an Internet fraudster.

I already know that Nigerian law enforcement agencies are corrupt, but they leveraged this move by our government to stretch their corrupt practices beyond imagination. They started harassing young lads who seemed to be well-dressed with a fairly decent standard of living. They basically gang up on guys and forcefully go through people's phones and other gadgets just to see if they will spot any App, screenshot, or just anything that's related to Cryptocurrency.
That sounds really bad, but it's not the worst part. The worst part of the whole thing is that when they notice you have any crypto-related stuff on your gadget, they will not make any move to follow legal procedures. Instead, they will try as much as possible to drain your wallet and steal from you. I call it "stealing" because that's pretty much what they do. They would force you to bribe your way out of the situation. That's pretty much robbery in my books.

If you are not from this part of the world, you would likely be thinking;

- Why would they do that?

- Maybe it's people y'all don't know you right.

- I will never allow that to happen to me.

Well, good luck with that. However, I can assure you we know our right to a tee. However, just because you know your right doesn't mean that another person won't step on that right of yours. You can even get yourself killed for standing up to the Police. And, this has happened countless times. So, this is just what we experience on the basic level as Africans who are trying to set their life straight through Web3.

Our Crypto/Fiat trading channel is also under attack by our Government.

Currently in Nigeria, a lot of people who buy or sell Crypto with Naira and vice versa are walking on a very thin line. Banks are forced to freeze bank accounts once they notice that a transaction is crypto-related. A lot of people have fallen victim to that while trading their assets and that's never a good experience for anyone. At the moment, we can no longer directly buy Cryptocurrency with any debit card that's issued by any Nigerian Bank.

Even the option to withdraw directly into Bank accounts is no longer available on several Crypto Exchanges. Thankfully, Crypto exchanges started hosting P2P (peer-to-peer) on their platform in 2022. Binance is one of those and it's the most popular Crypto Exchange in Nigeria. We used that until two months ago when they were compelled by the Nigerian government to remove the P2P trading option for Naira (Nigeria's local currency). That was the moment we realized that our government is only interested in making life miserable for us.

With this most recent development, a list of other crypto exchanges has also removed Nigeria's Fiat from the P2P trading section in their platform. Nigerians who are into Cryptocurrency were in disarray due to that change and we started digging for alternative trading options. Some are more secure than others and a lot of people have lost a huge chunk of their assets while trading because they ended up having to trade with malicious people. It's just awful.

These are just clear indications that Nigerians and most Africans struggle to thrive in Web3 because of the policies made by their local authorities. Regardless of all that, we still do our best to thrive in Web3 because we've already had a taste of it and we know that the future is in Web3. So, regardless of the negatives we experience while going through our Web3 journey, we will stand tall. Yeah! We will thrive as Africans in Web3.

Thanks For Not Missing Any Full-stop or Commas.

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