The leader of the United Kingdom’s Conservative Party, Kemi Badenoch, has lamented racial abuse she claims she has been subjected to.
Speaking during an interview with the Sunday Times, Badenoch said some of the abuse is personal attacks.
She claimed that the racial abuse is coming from both online and from a small number of Members of Parliament, labelling the hostility as “Kemi derangement syndrome.”
Speaking further during the interview, Badenoch lamented the racial abuse that she said she has been facing since she was elected the first black woman to lead the Conservative Party.
Badenoch said: “There’s a certain cadre of people who clearly can’t cope with the fact that I won this, and I’m doing it. The level of personal attacks from anonymous people is hysterical not just from MPs.
‘’I actually don’t think it’s that many MPs. I think it’s two to three people out of 120. That’s nothing. But online as well. People used to talk about Trump derangement syndrome. I think there’s a Kemi derangement syndrome: ‘How could she possibly have done this?’’
On social media, the Tory leader said: “There’s a lot of ethno-nationalism creeping up, lots of stuff about my race and my ethnicity and the tropes around, ‘well, she couldn’t possibly have done this all by herself.’
“I always try to think of every possible explanation before I go to race and racism. I think that is a healthy way to run a society. I remember when I stood up a few years ago and said Britain is not a racist country—ethnic minorities do very well here, it is white working-class boys who are actually struggling on a lot of metrics—and I got pilloried for that.
“My view is that there are people out there who will say whatever it is, they will throw whatever kind of mud at you, and they will hope that it sticks.
“When I hear those things, I can tell those people are not focused on the country at all. Many of those people who have those conversations think this is a game. But the lives of people in this country aren’t a game.
Pan-Atlantic Kompass reports that Badenoch was born in Wimbledon and raised in Nigeria before returning to the UK at 16.
In Nigeria, a lot of people hold different views about Badenoch due to her criticism of the country.
Badenoch has also distanced herself from her Nigerian roots.
