UK Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch has sparked debate after claiming that she cannot pass on her Nigerian citizenship to her children because she is a woman, despite Nigerian laws clearly allowing women to transmit citizenship to their children.
Mrs Badenoch, who was born in the UK to Nigerian parents and moved back to Britain at 16, made the claim during an interview on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS aired on Sunday.
She used her children’s alleged ineligibility for Nigerian citizenship to highlight what she described as the imbalance between Nigeria’s restrictive laws and the UK’s relatively generous immigration policies.
“I have that (Nigerian) citizenship by virtue of my parents, but I can’t give it to my children because I’m a woman,” the 45-year-old politician said.
“Yet loads of Nigerians come to the UK and stay for a relatively free period of time, acquiring British citizenship. We need to stop being naive.”
Badenoch, who is currently the UK’s secretary of state for business and trade, added that under her leadership, the UK would implement tougher immigration and citizenship rules.
“It’s been too easy. It is basically a conveyor belt. We want people who want to come to the UK and be net contributors, not people who will immigrate and then need welfare and social housing,” she said.
However, her claim regarding Nigerian citizenship has drawn scrutiny.
According to Section 25 of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution, a child born outside Nigeria is a Nigerian citizen by birth if either of the child’s parents is a Nigerian at the time of birth, regardless of gender.
This means that Nigerian women, like men, can legally pass on their citizenship to their children.
Badenoch did not elaborate on any personal efforts she might have made to secure Nigerian citizenship for her three children.
She is married to Hamish Badenoch, a Northern Irish banker and former conservative councillor.
The couple married in 2012.
Legal experts and political commentators have described her comments as misleading, noting that many Nigerian women abroad have successfully obtained Nigerian passports and dual citizenship for their children.
Badenoch, who has often taken a hard stance on immigration, reiterated during the interview that her goal is to reduce what she described as exploitation of the UK’s tolerant immigration system.
“We are allowing our tolerance to be exploited. That is not right,” she said.
“There are many people who come to our country, to the UK, who do things that would not be acceptable in their countries.”
