Miss Universe Nigeria fights South Africa deportation
Chidinma Adetshina appeared in a Cape Town court on Thursday as South African authorities pressed ahead with deportation proceedings.
Chidinma Adetshina, the former Miss Universe Nigeria, appeared before the Cape Town Regional Court on Thursday as her deportation case continued. She submitted an affidavit outlining the steps she has taken to regularise her immigration status. The case began in June, when immigration officers arrested her in Cape Town for allegedly residing in South Africa unlawfully. She was released on a warning, but the Department of Home Affairs is pressing ahead with deportation.
The case has its roots in the 2024 Miss South Africa pageant. Adetshina, born in Soweto to a Nigerian Igbo father and a Mozambican mother, had progressed to the Top 30 before her Nigerian heritage triggered fierce public scrutiny and backlash. The controversy was fuelled by xenophobic sentiment, with some South Africans questioning her eligibility. She eventually withdrew from the competition and accepted an invitation to represent Taraba State in Miss Universe Nigeria. She won the title and flew Nigeria’s flag at Miss Universe 2024 in Mexico.
Now she is back in South Africa, and the Department of Home Affairs wants her out. Immigration officer Adrian Jackson submitted documents showing that Adetshina and her young son had been living in South Africa without valid documentation. The department had already cancelled her identity documents in September 2024. She was declared a prohibited person on 19 December 2024. Minister Leon Schreiber dismissed her review application, upholding the department’s refusal to grant her and her son a letter of good cause. The minister also alleged that she re-entered South Africa from Mozambique while claiming to be a South African citizen.
The case is a study in the politics of belonging. Adetshina is Nigerian by heritage, South African by birth, and Mozambican by maternal lineage. In Nigeria, she was embraced as a symbol of resilience. In South Africa, she is treated as an interloper. The legal case is about documentation, but the cultural context is about identity. The backlash against her in 2024 was not just about pageant rules. It was about who gets to claim South African identity in a country where xenophobia is a persistent problem.
The historical parallel is the 2019 xenophobic attacks in South Africa, when Nigerian-owned businesses were targeted and diplomatic relations between the two countries soured. The sentiment that drove those attacks is the same sentiment that fuelled the backlash against Adetshina. The difference is that Adetshina has a legal team, a Nigerian title, and international recognition. The victims of the 2019 attacks had none of those. The case is also a reminder of the broader Japa trend — not just Nigerians leaving Nigeria, but Nigerians moving within Africa and facing resistance.
The South African government’s position is legally defensible: she does not have valid documentation. But the timing is politically significant. The case emerges as South Africa and Nigeria are trying to mend diplomatic relations. The deportation of a former Miss Universe Nigeria could strain those relations further. The question is whether the South African government will pursue the case to its conclusion or find a face-saving solution.
Winners: The South African Department of Home Affairs (if the deportation proceeds).
Losers: Chidinma Adetshina, Nigeria-South Africa diplomatic relations, the broader cause of African integration.
Bottom Line: Adetshina’s case is a reminder that identity in Africa is still contested — and that a Nigerian passport, even with a beauty queen’s crown, is not always a ticket to belonging.