Femi Fani-Kayode, politician and former aviation minister, is furious that Kemi Badenoch, a Briton of Nigerian descent, says Nigeria is “a living hell.” He calls down “hail and brimstone” on the woman who has become leader of the Conservative Party in Great Britain after the party lost this year’s parliamentary election to Labour.
Badenoch, 44, said in a recent Mail Online interview that she was “grateful” to have been born in Britain. “It was very much fate, and I would do anything for this country. I would go to war for this country, I would fight for this country. I would die for this country. This is my country. I love it the way it is. I don’t want it to become like the place I ran away from. I want it to get better and better, not just for me, but for the next generation”. Kemi was born in Wimbledon but spent part of her childhood in Nigeria. That for her wasn’t something she was/is proud of. Her harrowing experience, according to her, forced a hurried flight back to her place of birth.
Fani-Kayode, a proud, patriotic Nigerian, I must say, tried to run the fox to earth. He said in a post via X on Saturday: “A very… little girl and notoriously self- righteous… Ever considered staying in the place you “ran away from” and trying to fix it? You are worse than Aunty Jemima, the female version of Uncle Tom. By all means try your luck at being elected leader of the British Conservative party but leave my country out of your pretty yet stinking mouth.” He continued, “We may have issues as a nation but we must never support those who denigrate our country for political gain. Kemi sold her soul to the right wing of the British Tory party and sought to put to shame the land of her forefathers, just to become their leader. Nothing can be more despicable than this.
“I have seen many attempts to rationalise her insolence and none makes any sense. Loving those who hate you and consider you to not only be their inferior but also sub-human, in my view, is not a virtue but a vice. The demonisation of our country should not be a pre-requisite for winning the leadership contest of a political party in a foreign land and if it is, one cannot expect any self-respecting Nigerian to applaud it. Her victory in the contest for the leadership of the UK’s Conservative Party does not in any way ameliorate my disgust of and repugnance for her or the foul stench that trails her wherever she goes….”
The fury is unmistakable. But not like Shakespeare’s sound and fury that “signifies nothing”. If it were a real boxing bout between these two brother-sister been-tos, it would be both entertaining and bruising, wouldn’t it! But poor Femi taking on beautiful Kemi! Isn’t big boy Femi missing one thing, which is that citizenship now has “market-value”, meaning it can be gained by either “purchase or influence”. The only problem for sister Kemi is she is still paying for being accepted in the country she calls “my country.” Let me also remind good brother Femi that we are in a world order with different value readings. This is what Marie Corelli, the author of “The Sorrows of Satan”, says about the world being “as it is made.” According to her, “It is moved by the lowest and pettiest motives, it works for the most trivial, ridiculous and perishable aims. It is not a paradise. It is not a happy family of united and affectionate brethren. It is an over-populated colony of jabbering and quarrelling monkeys, who fancy they are men.”
Kemi has declared her readiness to “go to war” and “die for this (Britain) country.” But she wasn’t prepared to stay in a country where the cries of penury next door wouldn’t let her sleep at night. And power generators hummed and cranked all day and all night! It wasn’t in her then to determine to stick around and “fix things”. She fled. Like Andrew of old, Kemi “checked out” as fast as she could. That done, she must needs black-wash her motherland and whitewash her adopted home. You need to understand the mentality of the proselyte, one who has recently been converted to another faith, to a political cause/party, or accepted as another country’s national or citizen. Their psychoanalysis reveals a burning zeal to impress the converter to their new cause, new belief and new nation. This ultra sensibility leads to a fanaticism that is akin to mental paralysis or dysfunction. They desperately seek to be seen and believed to belong. My people have a saying: the man who learns witchcraft in the afternoon is to be feared most than one born with it. This is the Kemis we see. So let her be.
By the way, don’t I see something altogether sensual in this Femi/Kemi slug-out? Both are Yoruba and have UK connections. They are man and woman! Is a failed romance current running in the background? I am curious to understand the intensity, the power of Femi’s vitriol against Kemi. Remove the veneer of pseudo patriotism and let’s see what is underneath.
