Adeola Fayehun and Kemi Badenoch: The Science of Government
By: Deji Yesufu
Kemi Badenoch has been caught up in the eye of the storm again with Nigerians, particularly those in the diaspora. For some inexplicable reasons, Nigerians in the United Kingdom think they elected Kemi into the public office she presently occupies. Therefore she should be enacting policies with her party, the Conservative Party, that will benefit them alone. When you point out the fact that Kemi may have Nigerian roots but she is primarily British, put into office by the British people, they tell you that when Kemi was seeking to be MP (member of parliament) she depended a great deal on her Nigerian roots to curry votes from Nigerians living in the UK. This point can very easily be refuted. Kemi Badenoch is a politician. Politicians work with numbers: “The more the merrier” is usually the spirit that operates on the campaign trail. When they come into office, however, they serve the primary constituency that elected them into office. So, it is not surprising that Kemi courted Nigerian votes and appealed to them to be elected into office – and she will very likely do the same when it is time for the UK to go to the polls again. However, her main goals in office are the British people and helping to solve their concerns. Until Nigerians become the majority voters in Britain, they will have to rest content with a Kemi Badenoch as we have here today.
My primary concern in this essay is with regards to a video that Adeola Fayehun made on the recent policy position of the Conservative Party, which Kemi leads, where they made it clear that their party will champion laws that will make it increasingly difficult for foreigners to become UK citizens. In a video that Kemi made to make public this policy concerns, which hopefully the Conservative Party will make law when they come to office, Kemi is seen stating that citizenship rights which hitherto could be obtained over a three to five-year period, will now take between ten and fifteen years. Fayehun, in her video, felt that Kemi was unfair to deny others the benefit of a system that she had enjoyed in the past. Fayehun reminded Kemi that when she was born, the UK had birthright policies – where individuals born in the UK were given rights to be citizens of the country merely on the fact that they were born in the UK. A year or two after Kemi was born, the birthright citizenship was cancelled – just as the United States have also cancelled birthright citizenship under Donald Trump this year. Fayehun felt that Kemi ought not to be burning the bridge that she had used to cross over to the UK to obtain a better life for herself and her family.
Ignoring the simplistic reasoning behind most of Fayehun’s rant, and the unserious and jocular tone she used in her video, I still think that Fayehun’s video deserves a response. Adeola Fayehun could be regarded as a populist. She makes videos on the internet mostly to reflect the views of those who watch her channel, and since most of those who see her videos are Nigerians, and Nigerians are quite a number around the world, her videos gather viewership and she earns money from the number of views she gets – that is how social media works. So, since her views reflect the position of most Nigerians, particularly those in the diaspora, I think it is worth the effort to respond to what she has said.
Nigerians need to appreciate the fact that white people have a strong sense of history. They pay attention to where they are heading to, mostly from a healthy knowledge of where they are coming from. Many white people live off something called “old money” – the inheritances of their fathers. They understand how their parents got this wealth, and they are very careful about preserving these resources, while at the same time bequeathing it to their children’s children. While Nigerians eat family inheritance, and demand that no one question how they use monies stored up in their hands, white men are very careful about preserving their heritages. You visit a white man in his house, and he tells you that he is living in a house that his great-grandparents built in the early 1800s. This sense of history and tradition is even more pronounced with the Conservative Party. So, when Kemi Badenoch joined the Conservative Party as a twenty-five-year-old and then went on to marry a white Conservative Party member, she was learning their ways and committing her life to realizing the vision of these great people. Kemi says in one of her interviews that she is the leader of the Conservative Party today because her husband recognized her gifts and supported her forward. This man one day turned to his wife and said “You are better at this thing than I”, and began to give his wife full support. Kemi has served in many high-ranking offices under governments led by the Conservative Party. Most of us only heard of her after she became the leader of the party, and also the opposition leader. This kind of a person will not suddenly jettison the will and desires of her people, all because she has Nigerian roots.
Now, as we examine British history, perhaps it would be good that Nigerians also revisit their history – despite it being a very recent history at that. Many of the things I will write here might seem like news to Nigerians because my generation was sent to school with an accursed syllabus – one buffoon somewhere uprooted history from our curriculum. So that we learnt everything but the history of our country. In the latter parts of the 19th century, the British took over the administration of Nigeria. Before they came, this country was not a nation in the strict sense. We were a conglomerate of nations that were mostly at war with each other. The British brought order to the country by enacting laws for the peaceful running of our society. They also brought forth modern governmental systems. England is a monarchy. Yet, through the years the English people discovered that the science of government was better left to elected persons. That is to say, the people elected a few people to govern them on behalf of the monarchy. The British monarch is not a figurehead, as many of us think. They are a custodian of their history, etiquette, and general way of life. But the very act of governing a nation, via democratic means, must be left to a few people. Britain learnt from the French Revolution that if the monarchy is given absolute powers, and the country is run down, the people will turn on their rulers and there will be endless anarchy and wars. It was this science of government that Britain bequeathed to Nigerians. The story does not end here.
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After the Second World War, Britain was finding it difficult to cover the whole Commonwealth it held sway over. The British people had lost many able men to the First and the Second World Wars, and the countries that they governed in the Commonwealth were beginning to have educated and able men who themselves could handle the science of government. By the time India gained its independence from the British in 1947, all other countries in the British commonwealth, particularly those in Africa, knew that they also could ask for independence. Britain was ready to give these countries independence but she will not sit back and allow her years of labour and investments to go down the drain. Those who will take over the science of government would have to be able men like themselves.
The Action Group, led by Chief Obafemi Awolowo, could read the reasoning of the British and they quickly got to work. Awolowo led a team of technocrats to govern Western Nigeria from 1951 up to 1959. The Action Group had as its goal three things: to serve the people of Western Nigeria in such a way that the people would understand that a black man could do the same thing that the British had done. They also needed to prove to the numerous monarchies on the ground that they were better at handling office than the uneducated old men sitting on some age-long stool. The Action Group also needed to show the British that the black man could handle her affairs. With the success of the Action Group in the South West, and with constitutional democracy beginning to take root in most of Nigeria, the British handed the country to Nigerians to run. And to be sincere, from day-one, the Nigerian people began to make a mess of things. Things eventually culminated in a thirty-month civil war that claimed the lives of no less than three million people. As if Providence sort to give us a second chance, this country entered into an oil boom in the early to mid-1970s and she squandered all her wealth on frivolous things. Today, after a generation has ruined the country, they have now decided to japa and go to their mother country – England. This is why Kemi Badenoch frequently refrains: “I will not allow what happened to my country of birth (Nigeria), to happen to Britain”. And she has every right to this position.
Now, to Adeola Fayehun’s credit, she did mention in her video that Nigerians must commit to fixing their country so that this incessant embarrassment of her citizens abroad will cease. But the fact that it was a passing comment, shows that it was not a point she wished to emphasise. It is unfortunate that Fayehun has lived abroad for so long and still does not understand the mindset of the white man. The white man understands that he is here for only a moment. He understands that he has a duty to posterity to leave his country better than he met it. The white man is concerned with his name and reputation – rarely concerned with the money he can make from a system. It is the reason why British people are quick to resign from public office. They understand that such an office is not their birthright; that they are holding trust for generations to come. They also understand that if they fail in office, the only thing that will be said to their credit is that they resign when the people who put them in office lose confidence in them. Rather than castigate Kemi Badenoch, Nigerians should learn from this woman. First, learn what party ideologies and policies mean. Then understand how public office is run and held in trust. And then imitate what is good. There is no reason why Nigerians should not jettison this extremely expensive presidential system of government. The United States can run this type of government because they are a very wealthy country. Nigeria could consider returning to the Parliamentary System of government. Where there is a party in power, pursuing to implement policies. Where there is a healthy opposition keeping them on their toes. And where the public is watching the debate, observing whether or not the party in power is meeting expectations. And where they fail, they are simply voted out of office.
Kemi Badenoch is not Nigeria’s problem. I hope that Adeola Fayehun’s viewers will understand this.
Deji Yesufu is the pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church Ibadan. He is the author of HUMANITY.
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