Creating a UITableView Programmatically

When you register a class, and use dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:forIndexPath:, the dequeue method is guaranteed to return a cell, so your if (cell == nil) clause is never entered. So, just do it the old way, don’t register the class, and use dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:

- (UITableViewCell *)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView cellForRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath
{
    static NSString *CellIdentifier = @"newFriendCell";
    UITableViewCell *cell = [tableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:CellIdentifier];

    if (cell == nil) {
        cell = [[UITableViewCell alloc]initWithStyle:UITableViewCellStyleSubtitle reuseIdentifier:CellIdentifier];
    }
//etc.
return cell;
}

As for the segue, it can’t be called because you can’t make a segue to a table that you’ve created in code, not in IB. Again, go back to the old way and use tableView:didSelectRowAtIndexPath: which will be called when you select a cell. Instantiate your detail controller there and do the trasition in code.

After edit:

I didn’t see your added code there. You’ve implemented didDeselectRowAtIndexPath rather than didSelectRowAtIndexPath. If you change that, your segue should work.