Professor Bolaji Akinyemi, a former Minister of Foreign Affairs, has called out Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the UK’s Conservative Party, for her frequent negative remarks about Nigeria. Akinyemi accused Badenoch of using disparaging remarks about Nigeria to advance her political career.
Recall Badenoch has been under fire in Nigeria for a series of negative comments about her homeland.
Before taking the helm of the Conservative Party, Badenoch had described Nigeria as a socialist country plagued by a corrupt political class and widespread insecurity.
She also criticised the Nigerian police and lamented the poverty she experienced while growing up in Lagos, the nation’s commercial hub and most populous city.
Recently, Badenoch added to her controversial remarks, saying Nigeria destroys lives and expressing her determination to prevent a similar fate for Britain.
“And why does this matter so much to me? It’s because I know what it is like to have something and then to lose it,” she said.
“I don’t want Britain to lose what it has. I grew up in a poor country and watched my relatively wealthy family become poorer and poorer, despite working harder and harder as their money disappeared with inflation.
“I came back to the UK aged 16 with my father’s last £100 in the hope of a better life. So I have lived with the consequences of terrible governments that destroy lives, and I never, ever want it to happen here.”
Akinyemi, however, condemned Badenoch’s approach, arguing that attacking the nation of her birth was both unwise and a betrayal of her heritage.
“How can the daughter of a professor of UNILAG (University of Lagos) — her father was a medical doctor — a girl who went to the international school at UNILAG, make it sound like she was selling groundnuts and selling water in Lagos in order to advance her political career?” he asked while speaking on Channels Television’s ‘Politics Today’.
“She would soon learn that you don’t throw your people and your culture under the bus in order to advance your career.
“She is making a mistake, but she would soon learn.
“After all, right now, there is even a right-wing political party in the United Kingdom that is even to the right of the Conservative Party.
“So, what she should be focusing on is how to regain that right-wing profile of the Conservative Party and leave Nigeria alone,” Akinyemi concluded.
Source: Vanguard