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Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Politics
- Daily Mail
Kemi Badenoch reveals how she SNITCHED on a fellow pupil for cheating in an exam - and it led to him being expelled from their school
Kemi Badenoch has revealed how she once snitched on a fellow pupil for cheating in an exam - and it led to him being expelled from their school. The Tory leader recalled, when she was 'about 14 or 15', how she stood up during the middle of an exam and said: 'He's cheating, he's the one that's doing it.' 'That boy ended up getting expelled,' Mrs Badenoch admitted, adding: 'I didn't get praised for it. 'I was a relatively popular kid at school, and people said 'why did you do that, why would you do it?'. I said 'because he was doing the wrong thing'.' The Conservative MP told the BBC that following the incident she was told 'You don't belong here, you don't know how to behave'. 'I've heard that all my life,' she continued. ''You don't follow the rules, you don't do what you're supposed to'. ''You're always sticking your head above the parapet, you're too direct, you tell the truth when you don't need to tell the truth when you should pipe down'.' Mrs Badenoch was born in Britain but spent her childhood in Nigeria and the US before she returned to the UK at the age of 16. The Tory leader admitted she was a 'swot' at school and also 'the tattle-tale in the class, getting people into trouble'. 'Even then I hated cheating,' she said. 'I wanted to be first in the class, I'd done all the work. 'And then there's some people who are copying notes - why should they get away with it?' Elsewhere in the BBC interview, Mrs Badenoch revealed how the case of Austrian sex offender Josef Fritzl caused her to lose her faith in God. She said she was 'never that religious' while growing up but 'believed there was a God' and 'would have defined myself as a Christian apologist'. But this changed in 2008 when she read reports that Fritzl had imprisoned and repeatedly raped his daughter, Elisabeth, in his basement over 24 years. Mrs Badenoch, whose maternal grandfather was a Methodist minister, said: 'I couldn't stop reading this story. And I read her account, how she prayed every day to be rescued. 'And I thought, I was praying for all sorts of stupid things and I was getting my prayers answered. 'I was praying to have good grades, my hair should grow longer, and I would pray for the bus to come on time so I wouldn't miss something. 'It's like, why were those prayers answered and not this woman's prayers? And it just, it was like someone blew out a candle.' But Mrs Badenoch insisted that while she had 'rejected God', she had not rejected Christianity and remained a 'cultural Christian'. She said she wanted to 'protect certain things because I think the world that we have in the UK is very much built on many Christian values'.
BBC News
4 days ago
- Politics
- BBC News
Kemi Badenoch reveals how she told on exam cheat as teenager
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has told the BBC how she stood up in an exam and accused a fellow pupil of cheating, leading to him being expelled from school. In a wide-ranging interview with Amol Rajan, the Tory leader speaks about how her childhood in Nigeria shaped her politics and about her hatred of rule-breakers, she said she was "about 14 or 15" when she stood up in an exam and said "'he's cheating, he's the one that's doing it', and that boy ended up getting expelled".She added: "I didn't get praised for it. I was a relatively popular kid at school, and people said 'why did you do that, why would you do it?'"I said 'because he was doing the wrong thing'." Elsewhere in the interview, she talks about how she lost her faith in God but still considers herself a "cultural Christian" and about the lack of ambition some teachers in the UK had for black children in the was born in London in 1980, but grew up in Nigeria and the US, where her mother lectured. She returned to the UK when she was 16 to live with a family friend because of the worsening political and economic situation in Nigeria and, she tells Rajan, because she "really, really" wanted to be in week, she said she no longer identified as Nigerian - a comment that elicited a strong reaction in Nigeria, with a number of political figures accusing her of continually portraying the country in bad studied for her A-levels at a college in south London while working in a McDonald's restaurant and her interview, she speaks about the "poverty of low expectations" she says she encountered at college in London, when she says black children were steered towards vocational qualifications rather than A-Levels, and discouraged from applying for Oxford and stresses that it was not all of her teachers who displayed these attitudes and she did not think they were being racist, but that they "thought they were being helpful" by lowering BBC has spoken to the principal of Badenoch's college at the time, who said the college was "trying to do the best for every individual student, regardless of their background" and the Tory leader's comment on low expectations "just sounds like rhetoric to reinforce her political narrative".When this was put to her by Rajan, Badenoch insisted it was not just political rhetoric, and that "if people deny that these things happen, we're never going to fix it".She argued that it was not just an issue for black children, adding: "A lot of white working class kids have this problem where the teachers say, 'well, you come from the sort of family where nobody really wants to do anything. We're not going to push you. It's too hard. It is not worth it.'"That is not right." 'I rejected God' Badenoch completed a degree in computer engineering at Sussex University and worked in finance and IT before entering politics. She married banker Hamish Badenoch in 2012, and they have three her BBC interview, she speaks about how proud her GP father, Femi Adegoke, was of her when she became an MP in he was dying of a brain tumour in 2022, Badenoch says: "He cried because he knew he was dying and he said, 'I know that you're going to go all the way, and I know I'm not going to be there to see it'. And that was really sad."She also speaks about losing her faith in God after watching coverage of the arrest of Austrian man Josef Fritzl, who kept his daughter captive for 24 years in a dungeon he built beneath his whose maternal grandfather was a Methodist minister, said: "I couldn't stop reading this story. And I read her account, how she prayed every day to be rescued."And I thought, I was praying for all sorts of stupid things and I was getting my prayers answered. I was praying to have good grades, my hair should grow longer, and I would pray for the bus to come on time so I wouldn't miss something."It's like, why were those prayers answered, and not this woman's prayers? And it was like someone blew out a candle."But she added: "I rejected God, not Christianity. So I would still define myself as a cultural Christian." Since Badenoch became leader in November last year, the Conservatives have lost control of 10 local authorities to Nigel Farage's Reform UK, and slumped to third or fourth place in national opinion repeated her plea for "patience," insisting that she knew "the leader of the opposition's job gets harder before it gets easier"."I am somebody who people have always tried to write off, and I have always succeeded, and I believe that I can do that with the Conservative Party".Amol Rajan Interviews: Kemi Badenoch, 7pm on Thursday 8th August on BBC2 – and iPlayer Sign up for our Politics Essential newsletter to keep up with the inner workings of Westminster and beyond.
The Independent
12-06-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
45 minutes to pack up a lifetime as Pakistan's foreigner crackdown sends Afghans scrambling
The order was clear and indisputable, the timeline startling. You have 45 minutes to pack up and leave Pakistan forever. Sher Khan, a 42-year-old Afghan, had returned home from his job in a brick factory. He stared at the plainclothes policeman on the doorstep, his mind reeling. How could he pack up his whole life and leave the country of his birth in under an hour? In the blink of an eye, the life he had built was taken away from him. He and his wife grabbed a few kitchen items and whatever clothes they could for themselves and their nine children. They left everything else behind at their home in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. Born in Pakistan to parents who fled the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the ensuing war, Khan is one of hundreds of thousands of Afghans who have now been expelled. The nationwide crackdown, launched in October 2023, on foreigners Pakistan says are living in the country illegally has led to the departures of almost 1 million Afghans already. Pakistan says millions more remain. It wants them gone. Leaving with nothing to beat a deadline 'All our belongings were left behind,' Khan said as he stood in a dusty, windswept refugee camp just across the Afghan border in Torkham, the first stop for expelled refugees. 'We tried so hard (over the years) to collect the things that we had with honor.' Pakistan set several deadlines earlier this year for Afghans to leave or face deportation. Afghan Citizen Card holders had to leave the capital Islamabad and Rawalpindi city by March 31, while those with Proof of Registration could stay until June 30. No specific deadlines were set for Afghans living elsewhere in Pakistan. Khan feared that delaying his departure beyond the deadline might have resulted in his wife and children being hauled off to a police station along with him a blow to his family's dignity. 'We are happy that we came (to Afghanistan) with modesty and honor,' he said. As for his lost belongings, 'God may provide for them here, as He did there.' A refugee influx in a struggling country At the Torkham camp, run by Afghanistan's Taliban government, each family receives a SIM card and 10,000 Afghanis ($145) in aid. They can spend up to three days there before having to move on. The camp's director, Molvi Hashim Maiwandwal, said some 150 families were arriving daily from Pakistan — far fewer than the roughly 1,200 families who were arriving about two months ago. But he said another surge was expected after the three-day Islamic holiday of Eid Al-Adha that started June 7. Aid organizations inside the camp help with basic needs, including healthcare. Local charity Aseel provides hygiene kits and helps with food. It has also set up a food package delivery system for families once they arrive at their final destination elsewhere in Afghanistan. Aseel's Najibullah Ghiasi said they expected a surge in arrivals 'by a significant number' after Eid. 'We cannot handle all of them, because the number is so huge,' he said, adding the organization was trying to boost fundraising so it could support more people. Pakistan blames Afghanistan for militancy Pakistan accuses Afghans of staging militant attacks inside the country, saying assaults are planned from across the border — a charge Kabul's Taliban government denies. Pakistan denies targeting Afghans, and maintains that everyone leaving the country is treated humanely and with dignity. But for many, there is little that is humane about being forced to pack up and leave in minutes or hours. Iran, too, has been expelling Afghans, with the UNHCR, the UN's refugee agency, saying on June 5 that 500,000 Afghans had been forced to leave Iran and Pakistan in the two months since April 1. Rights groups and aid agencies say authorities are pressuring Afghans into going sooner. In April, Human Rights Watch said police had raided houses, beaten and arbitrarily detained people, and confiscated refugee documents, including residence permits. Officers demanded bribes to allow Afghans to remain in Pakistan, the group added. Searching for hope while starting again Fifty-year-old Yar Mohammad lived in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir for nearly 45 years. The father of 12 built a successful business polishing floors, hiring several workers. Plainclothes policemen knocked on his door too. They gave him six hours to leave. 'No way a person can wrap up so much business in six hours, especially if they spent 45 years in one place,' he said. Friends rushed to his aid to help pack up anything they could: the company's floor-polishing machines, some tables, bed-frames and mattresses, and clothes. Now all his household belongings are crammed into orange tents in the Torkham refugee camp, his hard-earned floor-polishing machines outside and exposed to the elements. After three days of searching, he managed to find a place to rent in Kabul. 'I have no idea what we will do,' he said, adding that he would try to recreate his floor-polishing business in Afghanistan. 'If this works here, it is the best thing to do.'
