Kemi Badenoch, the leader of Britain’s Conservative Party, came under fire in the past few days for her strong opinions on Nigeria. However, since she shared her lived experience of the Nigeria Police Force on Saturday, Nigerians have begun to share their harsh experiences with the police to validate her claims.
One such person is an X user with the handle @IrishNaija, a Nigerian who has since relocated to the United Kingdom after the police arrested her then-teenage son for dyeing his hair. She wrote that this incident was the turning point for her British husband, who decided his family could no longer live in Nigeria.
@IrishNaija said her son was 15 when he used to help her with deliveries while she managed a kitchen in Oniru. He had just stepped out of their house to retrieve an item when the police arrested him. This happened shortly after he completed his West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examinations (WASSCE) in 2018.
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After his arrest, she said, the police seized his phone and took him away from their area of residence in Victoria Island to an anti-cultism unit in the Gbagada area of Lagos. When the officers allowed the boy to call his mother, he asked, “Mummy, are you on your way? I’m so scared.”
I used to run a kitchen in Yesufu Abiodun, Oniru, where I supplied food to banks and offices in Victoria Island, Lagos. My 15-year-old son often helped with deliveries, as he had just completed his WAEC exams in 2018. On one particular day, we had a delivery close to our house.… https://t.co/6gihPSNkoV— Diary Of A Female Engineer (@Irishnaija) December 15, 2024
“My husband and I, along with our lawyer, rushed to the station. At the gate, they took our phones, and then I saw my son, half-naked and sitting on the ground with over 100 others outside the station. I collapsed in tears,” @IrishNaija wrote.
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She added that her British husband asked the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) what offence he was charging their son with, to which the officer responded, “Because he dyed his hair.”
“In the end, we were forced to pay for his release. This incident was a turning point for my husband, who decided we couldn’t continue living in Nigeria. What made this even more painful was the nature of our family,” she posted on Sunday.
“My children were homeschooled, had no social circles outside the family, and never went anywhere without us. They were raised in a closely-knit environment. At the time of this ordeal, I was seven months pregnant, and the trauma of the experience caused me to go into premature labour, resulting in an emergency C-section.
“My son’s only ‘crime’ was being a hard-working boy, helping with his parents’ legitimate business — a business that employed Nigerians. For my husband, a white British man, to witness such injustice firsthand was a harrowing experience.”
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@IrishNaija said that, based on her experience, Badenoch should be allowed to share her story because she spoke about what she had personally experienced. This sentiment has been echoed by many Nigerians on X, despite criticism from some, such as former presidential aide Bashir Ahmad, who accused Badenoch of defaming Nigeria.
Responding to a query about whether or not she trusted the British police on Saturday, Badenoch said she did, but her experience with the Nigerian police had been very negative.
“My experience with the police in Nigeria was very negative, and coming to the UK, my first experience with the police was very positive. The police in Nigeria would rob us. I remember the police stealing my brother’s shoes and his watch. It’s a very poor country, so people do all sorts of things,” Badenoch said in the interview.
According to Statista, about six in 10 Nigerians believe that the police are corrupt. A 2020 Statista survey revealed that 35.5 per cent of respondents stated that most policemen and policewomen were corrupt, while 25.5 per cent believed that everyone in the police force was corrupt.
The post ‘They Took Our Son’ — Nigerians Relive Police Brutality After Kemi Badenoch Comment appeared first on Foundation For Investigative Journalism.