{"id":7763,"date":"2026-01-06T18:49:06","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T18:49:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/7763\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T18:49:06","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T18:49:06","slug":"citing-lived-experience-in-nigeria-badenoch-defends-us-action-in-venezuela","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/7763\/","title":{"rendered":"Citing lived experience in Nigeria, Badenoch defends US action in Venezuela"},"content":{"rendered":"

UK Cabinet minister, Kemi Badenoch<\/a>, has publicly defended the United States\u2019 military operation in Venezuela that led to the capture of President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a>, describing the raid as \u201cmorally\u201d justified and casting doubt on the continued relevance of the rules-based international order.\n<\/p>\n

In an interview with the BBC\u2019s Today programme, Badenoch departed from the cautious tone adopted by most senior British politicians, arguing that while the legality of the US action remained unclear, its moral basis was defensible.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cMorally, yes,\u201d she said when asked whether sending special forces to seize Maduro was the right course of action. \u201cWhere the legal certainty is not yet clear, morally I do think it was the right thing to do.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Her comments came amid growing unease in Westminster over the US operation, which Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer<\/a> has said Britain was not involved in and which Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper addressed by reaffirming the UK\u2019s commitment to international law without directly criticising Washington.\n<\/p>\n

Badenoch argued that Venezuela\u2019s political reality made the situation different from previous US interventions criticised by Britain. Responding to comparisons with Margaret Thatcher\u2019s condemnation of the US invasion of Grenada in 1983, she said Thatcher was right at the time but that the circumstances surrounding Venezuela were not the same.
\u201cVenezuela was a brutal regime. We didn\u2019t even recognise it as a legitimate government,\u201d she said. \u201cI think that what\u2019s happened is quite extraordinary. But I understand why America has done it.\u201d<\/p>\n

She linked her stance to her personal background, saying her views were shaped by lived experience. \u201cI grew up under a military dictatorship [in Nigeria], so I know what it\u2019s like to have someone like Maduro in charge. I know what it\u2019s like to have people celebrating in the street. So I\u2019m not condemning the US,\u201d she said.\n<\/p>\n

While acknowledging that the raid raised \u201cserious questions about the rules-based order\u201d, Badenoch suggested that international law no longer carried the authority often ascribed to it. \u201cAs we all know, international law is what countries agree to,\u201d she said. \u201cOnce people decide they don\u2019t agree, there is no international law. There\u2019s no world police, no world government, no world court. These are agreements.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

She also questioned why concerns about international law had not been raised earlier, citing comments by Venezuelan opposition leader Mar\u00eda Machado. \u201cShe said Venezuela had already been invaded. It had been invaded by Russia, by Iran, by Hezbollah. Where were the people talking about international law then?\u201d Badenoch asked.\n<\/p>\n

Pressed on remarks by Stephen Miller, President Donald Trump\u2019s deputy chief of staff, who said the world was governed by \u201cstrength\u201d and \u201cforce\u201d, Badenoch indicated broad agreement. \u201cThe US has actually been saying this for a very long time,\u201d she said, recalling Washington\u2019s disengagement from the World Trade Organisation over alleged rule-breaking by other states.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe world has changed. What I want to see is a strong Britain. We can\u2019t control everything that the US does. Venezuela is very far away from here,\u201d she added. \u201cBut what they do respect is strength. And we are getting weaker.\u201d
Badenoch\u2019s remarks marked a shift from her earlier response on 4 January, when she said the UK was \u201cclosely monitoring\u201d developments and cautioned against rushing to judgement. In a post on X at the time, she described the situation as \u201cfast-moving and extremely serious\u201d and said the priority should be the views of Venezuelans \u201crisking their lives in pursuit of democratic change\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of noise from people who couldn\u2019t find Venezuela on a map yesterday,\u201d she wrote, adding that it was not for external actors to second-guess motives or evidence before hearing further from the US administration and Venezuela\u2019s democratic opposition.\n<\/p>\n

The US operation was announced by President Trump, who said American forces had captured Maduro and his wife and that Maduro would face criminal proceedings in the United States. Trump<\/a> later said the US would oversee Venezuela\u2019s administration until conditions were in place for a democratic process.\n<\/p>\n

International reaction has been mixed, with some governments warning about sovereignty and the use of force, while others have focused on the implications for Venezuela\u2019s prolonged political and economic crisis.
In Britain, Sir Keir Starmer reiterated that the UK had no role in the operation and stressed the importance of international law, while officials said they were assessing the situation and monitoring the safety of British nationals in Venezuela.\n<\/p>\n

Badenoch, no stranger to controversy
Badenoch\u2019s recent defence of the US operation in Venezuela marks the latest episode in a series of controversies the British Cabinet minister has courted over her ties to Nigeria and her interpretation of Nigerian law. While she described the US raid as \u201cmorally \u2026 the right thing to do\u201d and questioned the relevance of the rules-based international order, her comments follow earlier disputes in Nigeria over her personal identity and citizenship statements.\n<\/p>\n

Badenoch, who was born in London to Nigerian parents in 1980 and spent part of her childhood in Nigeria and the United States, has repeatedly sparked debate over her connection to her country of heritage. In an interview on the Rosebud podcast in August 2025, she stated that while she is \u201cNigerian through ancestry,\u201d she does not identify as Nigerian. \u201cBy identity I\u2019m not really,\u201d she said, noting that her sense of home lies with her current family in the United Kingdom. She added that she has not held a valid Nigerian passport for over 20 years.<\/p>\n

Her comments about Nigerian citizenship drew sharp criticism from Nigerian officials and legal experts. Badenoch claimed in a CNN interview that she could not pass Nigerian citizenship to her children because she is a woman, asserting that the country\u2019s laws make it \u201cvirtually impossible\u201d for her to do so. \u201cI have that citizenship by virtue of my parents; I can\u2019t give it to my children because I\u2019m a woman,\u201d she said, contrasting this with what she described as the ease with which Nigerians acquire British citizenship.\n<\/p>\n

The remarks prompted responses from several quarters in Nigeria. President Bola Tinubu<\/a>\u2019s spokesman, Bayo Onanuga, called on the UK government to send Badenoch \u201chome for proper re-education\u201d, accusing her of ignorance regarding Nigerian law. Human rights lawyer Femi Falana described her statements as \u201ca display of utter ignorance\u201d and accused her of misinforming the British public to score political points. Former Senator Shehu Sani questioned why Badenoch continued to seek Nigerian citizenship for her children after openly rejecting her Nigerian identity, saying she should \u201cjust enjoy her adopted home and leave us alone.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The Foundation for Peace Professionals (PeacePro) petitioned the UK Parliament and the Conservative Party, urging a formal review of Badenoch\u2019s comments, a correction or apology, and the establishment of guidelines to prevent ministers from making public statements about foreign nations that misrepresent legal realities. PeacePro\u2019s Executive Director, Abdulrazaq Hamzat, argued that Badenoch\u2019s remarks \u201creflect a recurring pattern of commentary that undermines the image of Nigeria on the global stage\u201d and warned that repeated misinformation from a UK Cabinet minister could strain diplomatic relations.\n<\/p>\n

Chief Niyi Aborisade, a British-trained lawyer and human rights activist in Oyo State, also criticised Badenoch, describing her statements as \u201cdefamation against Nigeria.\u201d Aborisade emphasised that the Nigerian Constitution does not discriminate against women in matters of citizenship and highlighted that Badenoch benefited from liberal British nationality laws, which granted her citizenship at birth.\n<\/p>\n

The controversies surrounding Badenoch\u2019s statements on Nigeria\u2019s laws and her personal identity have persisted for years, and they continue to generate attention as she comments on international issues, including her defence of the US operation in Venezuela. Analysts note that her public persona combines global political engagement with a pattern of provocative remarks about her country of ancestry, a stance that regularly fuels debate both in the United Kingdom and Nigeria.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UK Cabinet minister, Kemi Badenoch, has publicly defended the United States\u2019 military operation in Venezuela that led to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7764,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[5453,5454,122],"class_list":{"0":"post-7763","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nigeria","8":"tag-badenoch","9":"tag-maduro","10":"tag-nigeria"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7763"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7763\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}