Meghan is feted by Sussex Squad superfans ... then shares hug with a girl called Royalty
ON A humid open-air basketball court on the fringes of Nigeria’s capital, a local cameraman is beseeching the Duchess of Sussex to look down his lens. ‘Royalty!’ he shouts. ‘Come on, Royalty! Look this way!’
Crowded by well-wishers, Meghan winces at the pesky photographer’s protocol-busting impudence.
Notwithstanding that the Sussexes’ nonroyal visit to Africa’s most populous nation is, in fact, really rather regal, had nobody told him that the couple cut ties with the House of Windsor ages ago?
The 42-year-old ignores his entreaties and instead chats to a little girl in a princess dress who is presenting her with a bunch of red roses. ‘Royalty!’ the snapper cries again. By now he is little more than an arm’s length from the duchess.
This time the girl looks up and all becomes clear. For it was to her, not Meghan, he was
‘Nigerians are more concerned about getting enough to eat’
appealing. She is Royalty Ojeh, the six-yearold daughter of the chief executive of a Nigerian charity working in collaboration with Harry’s Invictus Games Foundation.
This was a day when not everything about the Harry and Meghan roadshow was quite as it seemed. Take the welcome they received when they arrived here, an Army sports complex in Abuja, for a volleyball match.
Nobody squealed with excitement louder than a group of banner-waving women in identical black-and-yellow dresses.
Surveying the scene, one of Harry and Meghan’s US aides hailed the ‘great reception’, adding the couple were having an ‘awesome time’.
But who exactly were the noisy women? After all, the public weren’t invited to this event. Like so much of the visit it was supOne posed to be ‘private’ – just military bigwigs, dignitaries and their families.
It transpired that the selfie-hunting women were by no means typical of the general public but formed the Abuja branch of the Sussex Squad – a group of superfans who have been known to launch online attacks on those who criticise the Californiabased couple.
To these women, Meghan is someone upon whom they can fasten their hopes, a belief bolstered by her declaration that she is ‘43 per cent Nigerian’. of them, civil servant Lizi Ben-Iheanacho, 59, says: ‘She is one of us and that makes us feel so inspired.’ In another nod to her heritage, the duchess wrote in a visitors’ book at the Nigerian Defence Headquarters: ‘With gratitude for the support of the Invictus community and for welcoming me home.’
However, she discreetly ditched a scarf in Nigeria’s green-andwhite colours yesterday after being presented with it only two minutes earlier. With temperatures topping 35C, it wasn’t a day for woolies. In any case, it clashed dramatically with her £2,275 striped Johanna Ortiz sundress.
News of Meghan’s Nigerian ancestry – which she is hoping to explore further during the trip – is said to have come as a ‘surprise’ to her father, Thomas Markle, who
considers his daughter ‘100 per cent Californian’.
Whether she will meet any longlost cousins in Nigeria remains to be seen. One wag watching Harry high-fiving fellow competitors during yesterday’s sitting volleyball match noted that – had we not known better – he might easily be 43 per cent Californian.
It was a thought that the King’s son did little to dispel on Friday when, while talking about mental health at a school in Abuja, he was dressed head to toe in beige and beads, looking for all the world like the leader of one of the Golden State’s emotional healing retreats.
Yesterday found the 39-year-old more of his old self in a polo shirt and jeans. He was cheered on by his wife but his team, Nigeria Unconquered, were beaten 25-21 by CDS, representing the Chief of Defence Staff, who invited the Sussexes to Nigeria.
Both teams included war wounded, some of them amputees.
On the duke’s team was former Nigerian soldier Peacemaker Azuegbulam, who lost his leg in combat against Boko Haram. He became the first African to win gold at the Invictus Games last year.
Afterwards the couple were ushered into a side room where they changed before a lunch with the Nigerian chief of defence staff Christopher Musa, followed by a reception which included performances from drummers and traditional dancers as well as remarks from various officials.
Dr Abike Dabiri-Erewa, chairwoman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, shared her delight at the duchess’s heritage.
She drew applause from guests when she exclaimed: ‘Princess Meghan is a Nigerian!’ And she admitted that when she first heard the news it wasn’t a shock: ‘I was excited but not surprised.
‘Because she is beautiful, intelligent, diligent and hardworking and she stands firm in the midst of challenges. ‘Prince Harry, you married the best – our daughter, our friend, Princess Meghan. I hope you come back again, again, and again. Princess Meghan, you married the best man.’
For all that it has been called a quasi-royal tour, and for all that there have been reports of the couple being mobbed, it has, in many ways, been rather low-key. In truth, perhaps that’s what the couple want.
But then why bring your own media entourage comprising favoured correspondents?
Certainly, the Nigerian media hasn’t been exactly gushing. News from the first day of the couple’s visit made the front page of just one of seven of its newspapers.
‘They are really not hugely popular here, a lot of people don’t know about them,’ says Kingsley Jeremiah, deputy bureau chief of The Guardian Nigeria.
‘Their visit is happening at the time when most Nigerians are facing economic challenges and are more concerned about getting enough to eat. If they were more popular you’d see a lot of Nigerians trying to catch a glimpse of them.
‘The state governments and the military hosting Meghan and Harry have been unable to pay staff salaries. So spending state resources on this kind of visit is something to really be bothered about.
‘The masses are really worried, inflation is going very high, the cost of living is not what it used to be for a lot of families. It seems to be dignitaries turning out for them, not ordinary people.’
‘It’s dignitaries turning out, not normal people’