Nigerian Politician Jailed in UK for 9 Years and 8 Months for ‘Despicable’ Organ Harvesting Attempt

Prosecutor says 'organ harvesting industry is difficult to detect'

Undated images of Nigerian Sen. Ike Ekweremadu (L), his wife Beatrice (C), and middleman Obinna Obeta (R), who were all convicted after an organ harvesting trial at the Old Bailey in London on March 23, 2023. (Metropolitan Police)

LONDON—A senior Nigerian politician, his wife, and a middleman have been jailed for bringing a young street trader from Lagos to London and trying to use one of his kidneys to save the life of the couple’s seriously ill daughter.

Sen. Ike Ekweremadu, 60, was jailed for 9 years and 8 months, his wife Beatrice, 56, was sentenced to 4 years and 6 months, and medical “middleman” Obinna Obeta, 51, was jailed for 10 years.

All three were found guilty in March of conspiring to arrange or facilitate the travel of the young man to the UK to exploit him for his kidney.

Their 25-year-old daughter, Sonia Ekweremadu—who has been diagnosed with a serious kidney condition called focal segmental glomerulosclerosis with nephrotic syndrome—was acquitted of the same offence.

It is the first conviction for this kind of offence under the Modern Slavery Act, which was passed in 2015.

Passing sentence at the Old Bailey in central London on Friday, Justice Johnson said organ harvesting was a “despicable trade” which preyed on the poor and vulnerable and he said the donor was “deceived and pressurised” into agreeing to donate a kidney.

‘Wealth and Power Inequality’

Johnson told Ike Ekweremadu: “The wealth and power inequality between you and (the donor) could not be more vast.”

Earlier this week the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) appealed for clemency for Ike Ekweremadu, saying he was a first-time offender who had made valuable contributions to politics in West Africa.

Martin Hicks KC, counsel for Ike Ekweremadu, said the former President of Nigeria, Olusegun Obasanjo, had described his client as “playing a significant role” in democracy in his country and helping to “throw off the trappings of military rule.”

Prosecutor Hugh Davies KC told Friday’s hearing: “Ike Ekweremadu had played a significant role in drawing up legislation in 2014 which prohibited the very activity he then engaged in. It was designed to protect economically vulnerable people in Nigeria, of which there are tens of millions.”

Davies had called for a deterrent sentence to reduce crime and said: “This industry of organ harvesting is difficult to detect and involves the exploitation of economically vulnerable people.”

The trial heard the 21-year-old man—who cannot be named for legal reasons—was falsely presented as Sonia’s cousin in a bid to persuade surgeons to carry out the £80,000 operation at the Royal Free Hospital in north London.

Undated image of Sonia Ekweremadu sitting next to a man who was allegedly lined up to donate a kidney to her, in a restaurant in London in February 2022. (Metropolitan Police)

The donor was rejected by nephrologists at the hospital and the transplant did not go ahead, but the couple then sought out other donors in Nigeria and switched their attention to Turkey, where the rules on unrelated people donating organs are more lax.

Ike Ekweremadu and Obeta, who both gave evidence, insisted the young man was an “altruistic donor” and claimed such selfless acts for complete strangers were common among the Ibo tribe to which they belonged.

Beatrice Ekweremadu denied knowing the details of the donor’s trip but told the jury: “My family means everything to me. Our children are the most important gift God has given to us, and we cherish them.”

Ike Ekweremadu—a former lawyer—was a well-known political figure in Nigeria and also possessed considerable wealth.

Character Reference From Nigerian Archbishop

Among those who gave character references for him was the Archbishop of Enugu, Emmanuel Chukwuma, who said he had known the senator for 29 years.

Chukwuma said he was “always helping the poor” and added: “His character was unquestionable.”

But his prison sentence is likely to mean the end of his political career in Nigeria.

The trial also exposed flaws in the medical visa system in the UK.

Ike Ekweremadu pays his respects to the Biafran secessionist leader Odumegwu Ojukwu during his funeral at Michael Opkara Square in Enugu, Nigeria, on March 1, 2012. (Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP via Getty Images)

The jury heard the donor the Ekweremadus had lined up was granted a medical visa despite not being a relative of the family and never having been interviewed by the Home Office or British embassy officials in Nigeria.

Questions were also raised about Obeta’s own kidney transplant operation in London in 2021 when again a medical visa was granted for a donor who was not related to the patient.

Giving evidence, Obeta admitted he had lied on his paperwork, claiming his donor was his cousin, but he said, “I was desperate to survive.”

Ike Ekweremadu’s brother, Diwe, was a former classmate of Obeta at medical school and knew he had undergone a kidney transplant in the UK.

Diwe reached out to Obeta, asking his own donor—who was also a Lagos street trader—to ask around, and that was how they found the young man who was chosen to donate a kidney to Sonia.

But the donor told the trial he had no idea he was being brought to the UK for a kidney transplant.

The witness said he earned 300–400 naira (55 to 72 pence) per day selling mobile phone accessories when he was contacted in late 2021 by a stranger—Obeta—who called him from England and offered to bring him to London and find him work.

Donor Was ‘Shocked’

Asked about what happened when he arrived at the Royal Free Hospital, he said: “The doctor asked me if I knew why I was there, and I said I didn’t. He said he wanted to do a kidney transplant. I was shocked. That was the first time I heard about a kidney transplant.”

He said the doctor told him not to worry and that they wouldn’t be going ahead with the operation.

The witness said, “The doctor said I’m not going to touch you and I should stop worrying and not be afraid, because I was crying and shaking.”

Although the donor denied agreeing to be paid for his kidney, prosecutor Hugh Davies KC maintained that the Ekweremadus agreed to pay him 3.5 million naira (£7,000).

After the operation fell through the donor fled Obeta’s home in south east London and walked across the capital before entering Staines police station in Surrey and explaining what had happened to him and how he came to be in Britain.

Ike Ekweremadu, from the opposition People’s Democratic Party, has been a senator representing Enugu West constituency since 2003. He was deputy president of Nigeria’s Senate between 2007 and 2019.

But on Friday the judge said his “political career was in ruins.”