Omoni Oboli in a new interview with Tribune, speaks again on her ‘faulted’ Aso Rock dressing.
See excerpts below:
Some people raised eyebrows about the outfit you wore to Aso Rock. Were you styled?
I was not styled.
Did you feel that the outfit was appropriate?
Yes, I felt so. Because there was really no vital part showing if you
saw the pictures online. And another thing is that the angles that a
picture was taken can portray certain things that was not there.
Why do you think people condemned it?
Actually, you should know that a lot of people are bitter. When
people are bitter they try to look for negative things in every positive
thing. It is unfortunate that we are in the limelight, because if
someone else wore that dressing no one would say a word. It comes with
the good and the bad sides. You cannot take the good and leave the bad
side. A lot of people are bitter. Some people are thinking why her. Some
people have been doing movies for twenty years: why her?
Maybe I should ask: Why you?
It is God’s favour. That is it. It can’t be something else. I shook
the president on that day and that was the second time ever that will be
shaking him. First was at the burial of his brother that all of us went
for, so we had the opportunity to shake him. This was the second
opportunity to shake the president. I do not know him personally at all.
So, it is just God’s favour. The truth is that favour is not fair. God
decided to smile on me. Have I had my bad times? Of course. Last year,
there was a time I was crying every day for months. Did anybody hear
about it? So, these things happen, it is just God’s favour. And I am not
going to let anything pull me down. First of all, I do not read blogs. I
do get to see the negative comments. It doesn’t matter to me. My true
fans know who I am. And these are the people who matter to me, not the
people who see the negative things.
Can you tell us how the screening of your movie by the president is a big thing?
It is a big achievement for the industry. It is not only for me. Like
I said earlier, every other person will be thinking: “what else can I
do to top the presidential screening?” And that translates into a
healthy rivalry. Healthy rivalries anywhere help to improve things.
Someone would be thinking I need to do something bigger. And that is the
way to grow. It becomes unhealthy when you try to pull me down because
you want to be on top. And this is the one thing I feel that the press
should talk about in Nigeria. The whole pull-down syndrome is wrong. I
always say to people, I do not want anybody to fail. My wish is for
everyone to be successful. The fact that you are successful does not
stop or hinder my success in any way. If you look up in the sky there
are more than a million stars. Have you ever heard that one fell down?
No. They are all there. There is a space for every star to shine. Until
we start to build ourselves, we are never going to get that level we
expect. Until we start to celebrate one another, we are not going to get
there.
Some people are also saying that something must have gone
under before the president could see your movie. What would you have to
say?
Why are they saying that? If it was a guy that did it I know no one
would be saying that. That is the problem. It could have been a guy’s
movie. Would they say he had an affair with the president? When it is a
woman’s case things must take a different dimension. This is wrong.
Women cannot always be relegated to symbols of sexual pleasure. I did
not have any affair with anybody. It was God’s favour that the
presidency was willing to see my movie. That is about it.