Actor Solomon Akiyesi who needs no futher introduction at this point, tells us his own side of the story. This is what he has to say
•I
loved Ezinne, my first wife, but she was deceitful, greedy
• If I hadn’t left Lillian, my second wife, I would have
committed suicide
• Uloma gives me true love, inner joy
On Saturday, April 13,
Nigerians were shocked when the supposed wedding of Nollywood actor, Mr.
Solomon Akiyesi, to Ms Uloma Agwu, turned into a major scandal in Lagos.
The ‘wedding’, which
was taking place at the Overcomer’s World Outreach in Aguda, Surulere, was
truncated when Solomon’s authentic wife, Lillian, stormed the church with some
family members, creating a scene and accusing the groom-to-be of abandoning her
at home in Port Harcourt while he was busy, plotting an illegal wedding in
Lagos.
It took the
intervention of policemen to restore sanity. The wedding was eventually
cancelled by the General Overseer of the Overcomers Church World Outreach,
Bishop N.E. Moses.
Since then, many
Nigerians have taken to the social media, raining unprintable invectives on the
Nollywood actor, who was said to have been married twice before his latest
failed attempt. In a chat with Daily Sun, Solomon tells his own story,
explaining why he decided to take the actions that he took, concerning his
marital life. Excerpts: Over the last one week, hell has been let loose on me.
I’ve not only suffered
verbal attacks, but also vituperations and near fisticuffs, all because of
another futile attempt of mine at my journey towards achieving that which I
honestly and passionately desire – a peaceful home and family. Social network
sites and blogs have been awash with how I left Lilian, my “pregnant” wife, to
marry Uloma, my Lagos “mistress” whom they also claimed was pregnant for me.
Nothing can be farther from the truth.
Only a mad or cursed
man would simply leave his pregnant wife and elope with another one. And lest I
forget, I urge you, as you read this, to have an open mind to listen to that
which is true instead of taking sides and jumping into wicked conclusions with
its attendant wicked insults and uncouth commentaries about how Solomon is
running his life and how he is not. I’m not asking for pity or trying to buy
anybody’s love at this time.
This is my life. If at
my age I don’t know what I want, then I may just remain the dumb ass that I’ve
been called over and over again. I don’t think I need anyone to give me any
lecturing on how I should exercise my privileges.
For the record, I
never planned on marrying more than one wife. And unlike the serial husband
I’ve been labelled, I had dreamt and planned a lovely home and family.
And my quest for this
dates back to 2003 after I had moved into Port Harcourt. I soon settled down
with Ezinne, my university days girlfriend, whom I ran into in Port Harcourt
during her National Youth Service. As fate had it, we couldn’t help reliving
old times and one thing led to another. One fateful, rainy Thursday evening in
October, 2002, Ezinne came to inform me that she was pregnant.
It was as far as I was
concerned, a devastating blow to the new life I was living; rap music, cars,
money and women. So, I told her the pregnancy was unacceptable to me. Besides,
I only just started working and needed stability. But months later, Ezinne was
to inform me that she was carrying a baby girl.
And knowing my
attachment to baby girls and not wanting to ever have a baby outside wedlock, I
repented and changed my thuggish ways and asked her to marry me, more so that I
was mature enough in every ramification. Or so I thought.
And so, sometime in
April, 2003, I hired a hall and invited a pastor to come officiate at my
marriage with Ezinne and bless our rings. All done, we went home and started as
husband and wife. God, the creator, knew how glad I was and looked forward to a
happy home. However, five days after that marriage, I called my new wife on my
way from work to ask what was up for dinner and she told me she had been in the
hospital.
I rushed to the
hospital and was told by Ezinne that she lost the baby. I got her discharged
and took her home. But I was completely broken at the loss of a baby I had
expected so much. Four days later, I asked my wife if she actually saw the dead
baby. She responded by saying the doctor brought it but she gave instruction
for it to be buried because she could not behold the sight. Instinctively, I
called the doctor – both to thank him and to confirm because he wasn’t around
when I went to pick her home. After thanking the doctor, I asked of the sex of
my dead baby.
The doctor didn’t talk
for like six seconds. I asked him the same question again and he said he’s been
restless in his spirit and that he could no longer keep the fact that there was
no baby inside Ezinne and that nothing like miscarriage happened in his
hospital. I challenged him again and asked if he was not the same person, who
confirmed her pregnant and that Ezinne had been attending antenatal in his
hospital.
He responded that he
had not set his eyes on Ezinne since October of the previous year. Meanwhile,
Ezinne had always taken money from me for antenatal and had even shopped for
the baby! It then became clear to me that this was a fluke all together.
Sadly enough, Ezinne
denied any wrongdoing. For three years, I exposed opportunities for Ezinne to
simply tell me the truth but she never took advantage of any of the
opportunities. Alas! She was not pregnant. I decided to investigate myself and
took her for HSG where it was discovered that there were no fallopian tubes in
her and that there was evidence of previous surgery of the uterus. I
independently probed further and found out with evidence that Ezinne had a
life-threatening abortion in 1992 that resulted in the rupture and subsequent
removal of her womb and tubes.
My biggest pain was
not what I found out but the fact that Ezinne hid all this from me all these years
and was still being economical with the truth even when confronted with hard
evidence! In frustration, I moved out of the house but not before taking her to
her mum in search of the truth.
Even the mum
corroborated what Ezinne gave as excuse for the scar that runs from her navel
down to her pubic region, i.e. she was operated upon due to menstrual
irregularities. I then decided to stay out for good. While I was out, my
relationship with Lillian whom I had known years earlier grew.
I was always going to see
her in Enugu. I then got me another apartment and Lillian came around quite
often too. Gradually Lillian grew from that little girl I was merely helping in
her schooling, into a mature, witty and intelligent young woman. So, having
taken my people to Ezinne’s place for the dissolution of the marriage – since
we did only traditional marriage – I proposed to Lillian.
And, in 2007, we
proceeded to the registry for marriage. And that was the day her father started
troubling me. He insisted Lillian was not supposed to go home with me. For two
years, he cut communication with me. Shortly after the marriage, my businesses
ran into a crises and my entire life nose-dived.
There was tremendous
loss in my finances. In my travail, Lillian’s father went to the police and
told them to deal seriously with me because I was an “irresponsible
son-in-law”. When the challenges kept mounting and seeing my life was at risk
after I was badly shot, I left town to sojourn elsewhere. In 2010, I gradually
re-emerged and we started finding our footing again.
Even though I tried to
settle down again, I found that the centre could no longer hold, as Lillian had
metamorphosed into a nag and had acquired a fire tongue with which she talked
me down and reigned curses on me at any little provocation. There was no week
we didn’t have a major fight, whether I was home or not.
At some point, she
became religious. And having found her way into Winners Chapel, she suggested
to me one day that it was necessary we took our marriage to God since we hadn’t
a proper wedding. She said her church pastors were willing to help in blessing our
marriage so there could be a turnaround. To this, I obliged. She said she would
love for us to wear wedding costumes for the purpose of photographs. To this I
also consented. And so, to Winners Chapel we went and were blessed and
certificated.
But it was as if that
blessing was what someone was waiting for before they would blow the whistle
that would usher me into the hall of pain. Lillian became insatiable.
You would see tiny
ingredients of marriage only when I could ensure her comfort. Once Lillian’s
comfort was compromised, she would lampoon me and tell me my life history in
graphic details and lecture me on what Mr. A and B have done for their wives
that I’m not able to do.
It’s even worse when I
try to remind her of the recent past that I laboured tenaciously to keep her
happy. Once she told me that there was nothing I had done in the past that
anybody couldn’t have done. Imagine sacrificing all you’ve got, including
almost your life, for someone who would tell you it’s no big deal and that any
other person could have done what you did. And then, suddenly, she wanted me to
quit my acting career or she would divorce me. My phones were always her best
companions at night. If she was not reading my texts, she was in my facebook or
BBM.
I had no peace. My
best moment was whenever I had to leave home for work. And after work I never
wanted to go back home. On a trip back home sometime ago, I was praying that my
aircraft should crash and I die instead of going home. Even when I was driving
home, I was under strong temptation to ram into oncoming vehicles instead of
going home.
It was either that a
long list of demand would be waiting for me or an equally longer list of
questions about whom I had been online with and whom I had been calling and not
calling.
Then on the side was a
supposed father-in-law, who claimed he regretted the marriage because he wasn’t
getting anything from it and that I only came to destroy the love that existed
in their family before the marriage. So, my joy knew no bounds when Lillian
told me last year that she was pregnant. For me, it was a good thing. Maybe the
baby would take her attention away from me at last. Then the heat started
again. I must provide N2 million for her to deliver her baby, even though she
knows my income and its source. When her pressure got to a head and to avoid
the same road I travelled with Ezinne, I took Lillian to a gynaecologist. A
scan was run on her and the result was declared before the two of us that she
was not pregnant.
This was after she
told me that she had done an independent scan and that she was carrying
triplets! Even with the medical confirmation, Lillian never stopped her push
for N2 million and money for baby shopping. I ended up suffering a partial
stroke in January. Yet she would wake me up at 2am to ask me of my plans to
raise N2 million for her, even while I was bedridden with stroke.
I knew then that I was
going to die in that marriage and had to do something about it. Ladies and
gentlemen, this is about my life. If what greeted the Internet and press was
that I died, trying to please Lillian and my marriage, people would still
insult me and ask why I didn’t take a walk. And taking a walk I tried to do but
I did not do it right.
I tried to skip due
process to avoid hurting anyone. More so, I did not have the political and
emotional will to ask for divorce. Pray, people, divorce is not like going to a
grocery store where you go to pay your money and come back with a bag full.
What would have been my ground for divorce? I should also confess that I could
not find an answer to what would happen to Lillian if I asked her to go because
I was more than a husband to her.
So, I foot-dragged to
the point of taking the easy way out. And the easy way is not usually the best
way as I found out on Saturday, April 13.
Uloma did not just
jump into the picture to “snatch” Solomon from Lillian. Uloma has been my
friend since 2006. We met again in 2009 at the peak of my business crisis and
have been seeing each other afterwards. Candidly, I was swept away by the love,
understanding and the peaceful disposition Uloma proffered even as a friend,
far from the opposites I was getting back home. The way Uloma treated me was
the exact desires any man longed for in a wife. So, I was always running to her
whenever Lillian lit her fires.
So, I asked myself why
I couldn’t marry her. Far from the evil rumour that I wanted to marry Uloma
because of her money, I wanted to marry Uloma to fill a vacuum in her life and
make her happy and fulfilled because this woman with a heart of gold who has
impacted many lives deserved to be happy.
If that was what I
could ever do to plant some comfort in her life. If there was going to be any
immediate gain for me, it would have been peace of mind and its attendant long
life, not her money or any physical or material gains. I’m not a lazy man.
Apart from being an
actor, I have been in business for almost fifteen years. Years back, when I
poured millions of naira on exotic cars and a posh house in Port Harcourt,
Uloma was a seventy thousand naira recovery staff in Sterling Bank. Today, even
if Uloma gave me all her salary from where she presently works, it won’t be
enough to put Internet credit in my tablets and phones. Someone even posted
that I said I would have ‘hammered’ if I had married Uloma.
What could I possibly
gain? Uloma wasn’t frustrated to the point of desperation to pay a man to marry
her. There was no award for anyone who married her. She does not own an estate
or anything willed to her by anyone that I was running after. Uloma is not the
daughter of any rich man or top politician. She’s as much a hustler as I am.
Ok, yes, sincerely,
maybe I actually would have ‘hammered’ long life, happiness, inner joy, a sense
of being loved and long life. I also would have ‘hammered’ having her sisters
as my sisters because they love me like their own brother – a far cry from what
my own people give me.
If I had married
Uloma, I know I would have had a good burial whenever I died because I’ve
always been scared that at my level of loneliness, whenever I die, my corpse
would probably have decomposed before my people would find me. I beg to be
loved and appreciated. Nobody to call my own.
No one ever cared
about me. I have always been alone and hardworking too. From way back, my joys,
my sorrows I have always swallowed alone. But Uloma was the only person who
truly listened to my heart and understood where I was coming from. So to say
any of my failed marriages was for money is simply stupid and unreasonable. The
first car Ezinne ever drove and financing for her first attempt at business all
came from me.
Lillian was not born
with a silver spoon. Her father is only a retired naval officer and the last
time I checked he had no wealth ascribed to his name. On her 18th birthday, I
bought Lillian an exotic Corolla car. At 300 level in school, I gave her a
Mercedes Benz.
Then she graduated
with an LS400 Lexus. This is apart from a lush apartment and school bills that
God used me to help her take care of. So, who amongst these would I have
married for money? Uloma stood out because she’s shared my pain even when it
was because of me and that explains why it was a difficult task telling her
Lillian was still in my tracks.
I couldn’t have
deliberately gone out of my way to hurt Uloma, because that will be simply
committing suicide. Hurting Uloma is like waging war against a nation. Is it
her legion of admirers I will have to contend with or her nation of die-hard
lovers who will be tumbling over each other to get a pound of flesh?
I wouldn’t give hurt
for the love and hope Uloma and her family gave me. Unfortunately the same
scandals I thought I was preventing by not doing what everyone is saying I
would have done is now the same thing staring me in the face, and everyone is
worse hurt.
And above all, my own
life is now seriously at risk because I feared hurting anyone. I ask all
concerned to please sheathe their swords of anger and find it in their hearts
to forgive me. I will make restitution as much as the mercy of God permits me.
It’s never too late to begin again as far as God keeps us all alive.
I’m a man on a mission
for a peaceful marriage, a good home and family life. I guess my desperation
took good reasoning off me. Again, I am humbly and truly sorry. I thank my
friends who have stood by me through this trial. Your comforting words are like
lights on my dark path.
And for the judgmental
few, I urge you; work with the truth while the Almighty fixes that which went
wrong in my life.
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