Anti-Western activist Kemi Seba seeks asylum in South Africa

Prominent Pan-African and pro-Russian activist Kemi Seba has applied for political asylum in South Africa, where he is being detained for breaching immigration laws, his lawyer told AFP Monday.

Seba, born in France to parents from Benin, was arrested in South Africa a week agoand is wanted in Benin on charges of inciting rebellion after backing a foiled coup in December.

The 45-year-old appeared in a Pretoria court on Monday alongside his 18-year-old son and a South African national.

Speaking to AFP outside the court, his South African lawyer Sesedi Phooko said an application for political asylum had been filed.

“Currently, we are only facing the charges of illegal immigration,” Phooko said.

“We are also challenging that because we have already brought an application for political asylum in this country,” he said.

Seba had overstayed his South African visa by around two months, a source close to him told AFP separately.

Prosecutors ask the court Monday for a postponement to investigate the authenticity of Seba’s passport, his residency status and alleged money laundering.

Seba holds a diplomatic passport issued by Niger’s ruling junta, which took power in a 2023 coup.

Foiled coup

Benin issued an international warrant for the influencer’s arrest on 12 December after he supported a foiled coup in which mutinous soldiers claimed on television to have overthrown President Patrice Talon.

“They have not yet brought a request for the purpose of extradition,” Phooko said.

“They have not yet brought the international warrant that has been issued because we have the belief that it is not yet ready,” he told AFP, charging that prosecutors “are trying to buy time so that they can fix everything.”

South African police said he was arrested on 13 April with more than 315,000 rand ($19,200) in a sting operation involving the third co-accused, who was to facilitate his transport to Zimbabwe with his son.

The case was postponed to 29 April for a bail application, with the trio remaining in police custody.

After Benin’s 7 December coup attempt, Seba — who accuses Talon of being too close to former colonial power France — posted a video declaring it was “the day of liberation” for his country.

The uprising was swiftly put down by the military with support from Nigeria and France.

Critical of France

The anti-Western influencer, whose real name is Stellio Gilles Robert Capo Chichi, has around 1.5 million followers on social media.

A prominent critic of France’s role in West Africa’s political, economic and military affairs, Seba has increasingly aligned himself with Russia, portraying Moscow as a counterweight to Western influence in the Sahel.

In 2023, French lawmaker Thomas Gassilloud, then chairman of the National Assembly’s defence committee, accused him of acting as a mouthpiece for “Russian propaganda” and serving “a foreign power that fuels anti-French sentiment.”

Seba has been sentenced in France for incitement to racial hatred and was stripped of his French nationality in 2024.

He has also faced run-ins with authorities in Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast and Guinea.

In 2020, he was expelled from Senegal over a 2017 protest in which he burned a 5,000 CFA franc note, worth $8.90, denouncing “Francafrique,” a term used to describe France’s post-colonial influence in Africa.