Kemi Badenoch has stated that she no longer sees herself as Nigerian, distancing from the identity she once embraced.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has said she no longer identifies as Nigerian and has not held a Nigerian passport for more than two decades.
Speaking on the Rosebud podcast, the British MP, who was born in Wimbledon and raised in Lagos, stated that although she knows Nigeria “very well” and maintains strong family ties there, she now considers the UK her true home.
“I have not renewed my Nigerian passport, I think, not since the early 2000s,” Badenoch said. “I don’t identify with it any more, most of my life has been in the UK and I’ve just never felt the need to.”
Badenoch, who is of Yoruba heritage, was born in 1980 and taken back to Nigeria as an infant. Her father, Dr Femi Adegoke, passed away in 2022. Recalling her last visit to Nigeria for his burial, she said she had to obtain a visa, describing the experience as a “big fandango”.
While acknowledging her Nigerian roots, she added, “I’m Nigerian through ancestry, by birth despite not being born there because of my parents, but by identity I’m not really. I know the country very well, I have a lot of family there, and I’m very interested in what happens there. But home is where my now family is, and my now family is my children, it’s my husband and my brother and his children, in-laws.”
Badenoch also described the Conservative Party as her “extended family,” stating, “It’s instinct, we recognise each other, we have the same sort of squabbles… Anybody who’s got an extended family with lots of drama will recognise that.”
Reflecting on her upbringing, she noted that while growing up in Lagos she felt both British and Nigerian. “I think the reason that I came back here was actually a very sad one, and it was that my parents thought, ‘there is no future for you in this country’.”
Badenoch has previously drawn criticism from Nigerian political figures over her comments about the country’s corruption and military rule. In December, Nigeria’s vice president remarked that she had the right to remove “Kemi” from her name if she was not proud of her heritage. Her spokesman responded at the time that Badenoch “stands by what she says” and “is not the PR for Nigeria.”
Now a prominent figure in British politics, Badenoch moved to the UK at the age of 16 to pursue her studies. She told the podcast that her experience in Britain defied racial expectations. “I did not experience prejudice in any meaningful form… That doesn’t mean prejudice doesn’t exist… But I didn’t, not seriously.”
