My daughter, who lives abroad, was traveling back out of Nigeria when, at the immigration post at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, the immigration officials looked at her passport and, seeing her surname, asked if she was my daughter. She felt her privacy was invaded, and…
— Kingsley Moghalu OON (@MoghaluKingsley) January 11, 2026
My daughter, who lives abroad, was traveling back out of Nigeria when, at the immigration post at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, the immigration officials looked at her passport and, seeing her surname, asked if she was my daughter. She felt her privacy was invaded, and replied “No, this is a common name in the Southeast”. They disagreed, and asserted that the name was not common and they thought she was Kingsley Moghalu’s daughter. Can you show us a photo of your dad if he is not the person we think? Of course she refused to do so. “Daddy”, she texted me, “Can you believe the immigration people asked me to show them a picture of you? Of course I didn’t. What kind of madness is this!”.
I called her and we had a good laugh. “If you were a proper Nigerian, my dear daughter”, I told her, “you might have even announced your father’s name even when you were not asked. You would probably have received courtesies that would shorten your process at the counter”. But I told her I was glad she stood her ground, as indeed that was an invasion of privacy and asking for a photo of her father was improper in reality, although in all probability the questioning was well intentioned.
Name recognition carries many implications, mostly pleasant and humbling. I receive tremendous goodwill wherever I go in my country, and relatives consistently report the same whenever they are asked (and affirm) whether they are related to me. But my daughter, while of course proud of her father, is a stickler for propriety! She was well brought up!