Human rights advocate and law professor, Joy Ezeilo, SAN, has lent her voice to the growing conversation sparked by UK politician Kemi Badenoch’s controversial comments on Nigeria’s citizenship laws, describing Badenoch’s critique as valid and rooted in longstanding legal discrimination against Nigerian women.
In a post shared via X (formerly Twitter), the former United Nations Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons in Africa said Badenoch was “a broken clock right twice a day,” adding that her remarks—though contentious—highlighted structural issues within Nigeria’s legal framework.
“The issue of citizenship in Nigeria affects all citizens, particularly women, by creating identity crises and hindering national development,” Ezeilo said. “The concept of indigeneship often limits women’s rights in both their home states and those of their husbands.”
Ezeilo pointed specifically to Chapter III of the 1999 Constitution, arguing that it “complicates this by treating women as inferior citizens, as citizenship is primarily granted based on descent rather than place of birth, unlike in countries like the U.S.”
She also criticised Section 26(2)(a) of the Constitution, which allows a foreign woman married to a Nigerian man to apply for citizenship by registration, but does not extend the same right to foreign men married to Nigerian women.
“This provision exemplifies sex discrimination and violates Section 42 of the Constitution, which guarantees freedom from discrimination,” she said, also referencing Nigeria’s obligations under international human rights treaties.
Ezeilo lamented the failure of past efforts to amend the constitution, stating that attempts by the 9th National Assembly to address these issues through constitutional review failed. She urged the 10th Assembly to take up the matter and ensure Nigerian women are granted equal rights to confer citizenship on their foreign spouses.
“For further reading,” she said, “see my article, The 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Woman Question, published in NJR, Vol. 8, 2000/2001.”
However, Ezeilo’s position differs from that of human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN, who faulted Badenoch for her statement during a CNN interview where she claimed she could not pass Nigerian citizenship to her children because she is a woman.
Falana dismissed the assertion as “a display of utter ignorance,” insisting that Badenoch’s children, born abroad, are Nigerian citizens by virtue of Section 25 of the 1999 Constitution, which grants citizenship to anyone born outside Nigeria to a Nigerian parent, regardless of gender.
“Contrary to her misleading claim, her children are Nigerians because she is a Nigerian,” Falana said in a statement issued on Monday. “Her assertion is not in consonance with the Constitution. The fact that she may not want them to claim it is irrelevant.”
Falana, however, agreed that the law discriminates against Nigerian women in another area citizenship by registration—pointing out that while foreign women married to Nigerian men can acquire citizenship, the reverse is not true.
“That reflects the patriarchal nature of the law and should be urgently amended,” he said.
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