Nigerian government hits out at Kemi Badenoch after she criticised country

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New Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch is embroiled in a diplomatic row over comments she made about the African country where she grew up.

The vice-president of Nigeria has hit out at the Tory MP accusing her of “denigrating her country of origin.”

But her spokesman hit back, saying that the outspoken politician “tells it like it is… and she stands by what she says.”

Ms Badenoch has made a number of critical comments about Nigeria, where she lived until she moved to the UK in her teens.

During her unsuccessful bid to lead the Tory party in 2022 she said: “I grew up in Nigeria and I saw first-hand what happens when politicians are in it for themselves, when they use public money as their private piggy banks, when they promise the earth and pollute not just the air but the whole political atmosphere with their failure to serve others.

“I saw what socialism is for millions. It’s poverty and broken dreams. I came to Britain to make my way in a country where hard work and honest endeavour can take you anywhere.”

Ms Badenoch was born in the UK but moved back to the African country, with both her parents who are Nigerian.

When she was in Nigeria, her father was a GP and her mother was a lecturer in physiology.

Badenoch’s spokesperson hit back, saying “Kemi is not interested in doing Nigeria’s PR, she is the Leader of the Opposition in the UK.

“She tells the truth. She tells it like it is. She’s not going to couch her words, and she stands by what she says.”

Giving a speech on migration on Tuesday, Kashim Shettima is reported to have said Badenoch has been “denigrating her country of origin.”

He praised former prime minister Rishi Sunak as a “brilliant young man, he never denigrated his nation of ancestry.”

He continued: “Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the British Conservative party. We are proud of her in spite of her efforts at denigrating her nation of origin.”

And he received applause when he added: “She is entitled to her own opinions; she has even every right to remove the Kemi from her name but that does not underscore the fact that the greatest Black nation on earth is the nation called Nigeria.”