Kemi Badenoch, a prominent British Conservative Party leader and the UK’s Business Secretary, has spoken candidly about her personal identity, expressing that while she acknowledges her Nigerian ancestry, she now considers Britain her true home.
In a recent interview on the Rosebud podcast hosted by Gyles Brandreth, Badenoch reflected on her upbringing, family ties, and the emotional distance she feels from Nigeria despite her heritage.
Badenoch revealed that she has not renewed her Nigerian passport since the early 2000s, stating, “I don’t identify with it anymore; most of my life has been in the UK, and I’ve just never felt the need to.”
She recalled an emotional moment when she had to obtain a visa to visit Nigeria after her father’s passing, saying, “When my dad died, I had to get a visa to go to Nigeria. Because I’m Nigerian through ancestry, by birth—despite not being born there—because of my parents. But by identity, I’m not really.”
Despite her detachment from Nigerian identity, Badenoch emphasized that she remains deeply interested in the country due to family connections. “I know the country very well, I have a lot of family there, and I’m very interested in what happens there,” she said.
However, she firmly stated that her sense of belonging lies in the UK, where her immediate family and political career are rooted. “Home is where my now family is—my children, my husband, my brother, and his children. The Conservative Party is very much part of my family, my extended family, I call it,” she explained.
Badenoch also shared the circumstances that brought her to the UK at age 16, revealing that her parents made the difficult choice to leave Nigeria due to concerns about her future. “I think the reason I came back here was actually a very sad one—it was that my parents thought, ‘There is no future for you in this country,’” she said.
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