A champion of Black conservatism
Madu hits all right notes in changing party
Kaycee Madu, the Kenney government’s new minister of justice, favours free enterprise, dislikes politics that focus on group identity, is against defunding the police, and believes in the Martin Luther King, Jr. formula for a just and prosperous society.
In openly and proudly espousing such views, Madu, 45, has become a new champion of a surging North American movement, Black conservatives. “I am excited,” Madu says. “I am encouraged that the vast majority of Black people are beginning to wake up to realize that the political philosophy and the values that build a merit- based system, where it doesn’t matter where you come from, that promotes hard work, is one that ultimately we will benefit from.”
The intellectual mover of this diverse group ranging from libertarians to social conservatives, is American economist Thomas Sowell, a longtime critic of the welfare state.
Madu’s political values are rooted in his youth in Nigeria, an African economic power of 196 million people held back by corruption and ethnic strife. Madu’s own Igbo people of southeastern Nigeria have faced discrimination in the wake of a civil war 50 years ago where their secessionist movement was defeated. Several million Igbo perished, mainly from pogroms and starvation.
Madu’s father fought for the losing side and afterwards lost all his assets, including his butcher business. Igbo people have also been denied many opportunities, such as government jobs.
Kaycee was born in 1975, the seventh of 11 children. By becoming a street trader in clothing and other goods in the city of Lagos, he paid his own way through university.
In the face of discrimination, his answers were hard work and treating others with respect and kindness, he says. Madu also rejected Igbo secessionism in favour of Nigerian nationalism, believing the best way forward for the multi- ethnic nation was together.
He notes that during the 2019 election when he campaigned in his predominantly white suburban Edmonton riding, no one asked him about his race or his group, only about his policies. But if he were in Nigeria and ever ran for president, he says no one would listen to him.
“The first thing they are going to ask me, ‘But you are Igbo?’ It is shocking.”
For this reason, Madu is firmly against the current trend towards identity politics, where group interests and racial identity are pushed to the forefront of every societal issue.
“I have no sympathy or room for identity-based politics,” he says. “I do believe if we build a merit-based society where each and every one of us is judged on the content of our character, very much like the Rev. Martin Luther King said, that is the system that has the potential to lift all of the human population out of difficulties and poverty.”
Madu is also no fan of the Black Lives Matter political movement’s push to defund the police.
There are a few bad apples in any field, including in law and the police, he says, but that’s no reason for defunding.
“I think it is nonsensical,” he says. “I don’t understand why any Black movement that wants to seek justice, fairness and equality will … seek to defund dollars and resources from an institution that is taking the most risk, on all of our behalf, the risk to themselves and their families, to ensure we are safe in our homes.”
Madu and his wife Emem came to Canada to live in a free society and have generally found it welcoming. That said, as Madu worked his way up from hospital dishwasher to law student, from government lawyer to cabinet minister, he says he experienced racism.
“Unfortunately racism is real. I don’t want to minimize that.”
He says he encountered it when he applied for jobs with local law firms under his given name of Kelechi. He got no interest on dozens and dozens of applications until he anglicized his name to Kaycee. Suddenly, he started to get interviews. His wife, a top graduate out of law school, faced the same issue, he says.
The good news, he says, is that, “Canadians are welcoming and they are prepared to give you the opportunity if you are prepared to work hard. That is so true about Alberta.”
For his latest appointment, Madu got worldwide exposure as the first Black justice minister in Canada. Madu will have much to prove in this high-profile and difficult new role, but given personal experience, work ethic and rapid rise, not to mention the content of his character, I have to wonder if he might one day challenge for even higher office.