“It would have cost me £140 on the train, £30 for a match ticket and around £100 for a hotel to go to Millwall. But instead I got an £80 return flight, £16 match ticket and £100 hotel in Marrakech.”

Meet Scott Wood, the Hull City fan who before Christmas, opted for a January trip to Marrakech to watch the Africa Cup of Nations simply because it was cheaper.

Wood’s choice isn’t just quirky, it highlights a stark travel paradox: for many Europeans, flying to Africa can be cheaper than traveling within Africa itself. Wood found an £80 round-trip flight a bargain by European standards while many Africans struggle with high airfares on intra-continental routes.

For example, a return flight from Harare, Zimbabwe to Marrakech typically starts around £706, with average return fares closer to £1,115 depending on airline and routing. One-way fares alone to Marrakesh can be around £428 or more. Most routes from Zimbabwe to Morocco involve at least one stop, often routing through major hubs like Johannesburg, Addis Ababa or Istanbul, adding time and cost for passengers.

On top of expensive tickets, Africans face visa hurdles. Zimbabwean citizens must obtain a visa to visit Morocco, with applications required well before travel. These additional steps paperwork, embassy visits, and application fees raise barriers and costs that many Europeans don’t encounter when moving freely across borders in Schengen Europe.

Contrast that with intra-African travel, where visa restrictions and limited direct flight options often make journeys long and expensive. For instance, traveling between many Southern African states still requires passports and sometimes multiple visas despite geographic proximity.

The African Union has long acknowledged this imbalance. Under Agenda 2063, the AU is promoting a Visa-Free Africa and the issuance of an African passport to ease the movement of people across borders. The goal is not just easier tourism, but boosting intra-Africa trade, labour mobility, skills transfer, and regional integration areas currently hampered by restrictive movement rules that leave many Africans priced out of travel within their own continent.

Wood’s cheaper jaunt to Morocco may seem like a football fan’s holiday decision but it also underlines a deeper truth: African skies still need to be opened for Africans if regional integration and opportunity are to become realities.