Kemi Badenoch has revealed she no longer considers herself Nigerian and has not renewed her passport for the country in over two decades. The Conservative Party leader made the comments during an interview with the Rosebud podcast, explaining her complex relationship with her country of origin.
Badenoch was born in the UK but spent her childhood in Nigeria before returning to Britain as a teenager. When Nigeria's economy collapsed in the 1990s, her parents used her British passport to send her back to the UK at age 16, where she lived with a family friend in south London to continue her education.
Passport not renewed since 2000s
The North West Essex MP said she had not renewed her Nigerian passport since the early 2000s. "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," she explained.
She described having to obtain a visa to visit Nigeria when her father died, calling the process a "big fandango". Despite her ancestral connections, Badenoch said her identity is firmly rooted in Britain rather than Nigeria.
Family ties define home
"I'm Nigerian through ancestry, by birth, despite not being born there because of my parents... but by identity I'm not really," Badenoch said. She acknowledged knowing the country well and having family there, but emphasised that home is where her immediate family lives.
"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. The Conservative party is very much part of my family - my extended family, I call it," she added.
Early experiences shaped politics
Badenoch said her early experiences in Nigeria shaped her political outlook, including "why I don't like socialism". She recalled never quite feeling that she belonged there during her childhood years.
The Tory leader described her return to the UK as a teenager as happening for "a very sad" reason. "It was that my parents thought: 'There is no future for you in this country'," she explained.
No meaningful racial prejudice
Badenoch said she has not experienced racial prejudice in Britain "in any meaningful form". She knew she would look different when she arrived but did not find this concerning.
"What I found actually quite interesting was that people didn't treat me differently, and it's why I'm so quick to defend the UK whenever there are accusations of racism," she said.
(PA/London) Note: This article has been edited with the help of Artificial Intelligence.
