“You Cannot Come Here and Create a Mini-Nigeria” — Badenoch Says UK Should Reject Immigrants from Countries That Allow Child Marriages and Criminalise LGBTQ People

UK Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch has said the United Kingdom should not welcome immigrants from countries whose cultural values clash with British principles. Speaking during an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria on Sunday, Badenoch argued that immigration policy must consider the cultural backgrounds of newcomers and how those might affect British society.

Badenoch, who was born to Nigerian Yoruba parents and spent part of her childhood in Nigeria, stressed that cultural alignment matters more than mere immigration numbers. “Culture matters more,” she said. “There is something that people from around the world are coming \[to the UK] to get… enlightenment values, equality under the law, freedom of speech, freedom of association, women having equal rights, the rule of law.”

She warned that the arrival of large numbers of immigrants who do not share these values could gradually change the fabric of British society. “If you have a large number of people who don’t believe in those things, eventually your country will change,” she said.

The Conservative leader, who also serves as the UK’s Opposition Leader, said she does not believe all cultures are equal. “Some people may not like to hear that, but cultures where there’s child marriage, where homosexuals, gay people are treated criminally and killed—those are not equal cultures,” she said. “Cultures where women are less as citizens—those are not equal cultures. And when we have large numbers of people coming into a country, that does change things.”

Badenoch accused some immigrants of taking advantage of Britain’s liberal asylum policies, citing examples of individuals allegedly pretending to be gay or converting to Christianity to avoid deportation. “We have people pretending, for instance, to be homosexual so that they can claim asylum, and then they go on to get married and have children. They’re abusing the laws that we have,” she said. “Parish priests are very excited, ‘Oh, these Muslims want to convert to Christianity.’ They convert so that they can claim asylum and say, ‘If I went back to my country, I can be persecuted.’”

She described these actions as exploitation of a system that was “not designed for this sort of thing” and called for greater honesty in addressing the issue.

Badenoch also took a firm stance against cultural replication, saying she would not allow anyone to immigrate to the UK and attempt to recreate their home country within British society. “You cannot come here and create a mini-Nigeria,” she stated.

She concluded that, under her leadership, only immigrants who are net contributors to the UK—those who do not rely on welfare or public housing—would be welcome.