Kemi Badenoch Nigerian identity remarks stir diaspora debates, mixing politics, heritage, and humour over what it means to resign from one’s roots

Kemi Badenoch’s recent declaration that she no longer identifies as Nigerian sparked a wave of reactions across the diaspora.

Also read: UK-based Nigerian replaces Kemi Badenoch’s brother’s ‘stolen shoes, wristwatch’ (Video)

For me, it was a case study in identity, heritage, and the curious ways politics tries to rewrite personal history…. and the humour writes itself.

Once upon a time, in the curious kingdom of Westminster, there lived a woman called Olukemi – Gift of God.

Not just any gift, mind you. This was the kind of gift that comes wrapped in Yoruba vowels, sealed with ancestral stamps, and delivered with a history, longer than the River Niger.

But one sunny political morning, Olukemi – now Kemi Badenoch – told the world she had resigned from being Nigerian.

Yes, resigned. No resignation letter to the Nigerian High Commission. No press conference in Lagos. Just an elegant announcement on a British medium: “I no longer identify as Nigerian.”

She has not renewed her Nigerian passport for (plus or minus) 20 years. So, to be fair, in Nigerian immigration terms, that’s practically, a little over, two entire administrations, three airport renovations, and a handful of “Japa” waves.)

And yet… she remains KEMI.

A name so unapologetically Nigerian, it carries its own praise poetry: – like an Adekemi (my crown’s gift), or an Oluwakemisola (the Lord pampers me with wealth), and, if we’re being linguistically playful, we might say… Kemi-Can’t-Delete-Her-Roots… Read full article here.