Sonia, the daughter of embattled former deputy senate president, Ike Ekweremadu, says she feels guilty that her parents were convicted because they were looking for ways to find a solution to her health condition.
Ekweremadu’s daughter stated this in an interview with the BBC on Friday.
In March 2023, a UK jury found that Ekweremadu, his wife Beatrice, and a doctor, Obinna Obeta, criminally conspired to bring a 21-year-old Lagos street trader to London to exploit him for his kidney.
The young man was said to have been falsely presented as Sonia’s cousin in a failed bid to persuade doctors to carry out an £80,000 private procedure at the Royal Free Hospital in London.
An Old Bailey Court jailed all three of them on Friday.
Ekweremadu was sentenced to nine years and eight months, Beatrice was sentenced to four years and six months in prison, while “middleman” medical doctor Obeta received a 10-year prison term.
But Sonia, who is currently undergoing dialysis and was also on trial alongside her parents, was not convicted.
Sonia said she and her siblings were surprised when the police knocked on their door and informed them of their purpose.
Sonia said she disagreed with the conviction of her parents.
She said, “I understand the conviction, however, I personally disagree with it. That is from a very bias perspective as their daughter, I will obviously always back my parents.
“However, the law has taken its course, we just need to move on as one family,” she added.
She described her disease as Nephrotic syndrome, a kind of kidney disorder that makes the body pass too much protein in urine.
When asked about the man who was supposed to donate his kidney to her, she said she was not involved in the process.
She said, “I didn’t have a hand in it, it was mostly my family that handled everything about my medical side.
“I don’t think things will ever be the same, already I feel guilty, because I feel all these happened because of me,” she added.