His social life was blunted. Perhaps by his reticent disposition. His persona, two dimensional. To a distant public, he was upscale and cool.
His manly bearing spoke loud. His onscreen image ironically amplified some
idiosyncrasies; heroics, romantic
adventures, and traits that did not gel with the mortal privacy that eerily define his quiet and
lonely life.
Saint
Obi, real name, Obinna Nwafor, was shy, almost bordering on timidity and
insecurity. He cherished the pleasantly tranquil interactions among a few
friends. He would vanish at any outburst that could upset the poise of such
small meetings. As he repeatedly told me, he just wanted to live a cool, quiet, and fulfilled life.
But, has he lived this cool and fulfilled
life he envisioned? I have my doubts.
I tell Saint's story here with painful tears
in my eyes; because he was a star, a superstar whose life turned out a gleam
of irony.
Yet,
it was this stardom that fetched him his much-professed financially strong and
powerful wife. And their wedding, that solemn ritual of love would drastically alter the cause of
his life and tragically yank him off the creative community that threw him up
for the wife to capture and indeed conquer.
Their
marriage was at best a dramatisation of love. It was quick. He barely told us
that he had found a wife. Then, the marriage happened. It was a mystique, only those
involved understood the histrionics that played out. None of us who were his closest pals, who
walked with him through the crucible to the crest of his career in Nollywood,
none of us was invited.
The distance between us and the guy I
admirably called Saint of the Storm had begun. This gulf would widen with each
year. We saw him perhaps once a year after this marriage.
And life actually seemed to have given him a
fair shake of the dice. He dressed well, drove big cars, and even his skin, in literal lingo, spelt
wellness.
The Saint would be blessed with three
beautiful children. But not on one occasion were his friends in Nollywood
invited for christening or birthday. We were told that his wife was in the
topmost hierarchy of telecom giant, MTN. But even if their celebrations were
designed to be a rendezvous of the elites of the technocracies that his wife
chiefly belonged, you expected that Saint would reach out to a few of his
fellow creatives, for even if they would herald his small beginnings, there could be no tinge of shame to it
because we all have our journeys and our stories.
And even at that, the actor or cineaste in
Nollywood is by no means poor.
But more tragic is the fact that his marriage
did not only take away Obinna from his friends, but it also took him away from
Nollywood. Saint stopped acting,
absconded from his career and perhaps his calling. It would seem prognostic
now. Yes, because I recall leaving my house in Lagos Mainland for his massive
office in Lekki, Victoria Island, Lagos. It was about six years ago. There, I
demanded to know why my friend abandoned our industry. He told me with his
usual shy expression that he wanted to focus on other businesses and work behind the camera.
Because his visage was unconvincing to me, I
told him in stark terms, that whatever his new vision and pursuits, he must not
abandon the trade that made him who he was.
It took another three years for Saint to
return to his homies. But when he did, some of the deeply disappointed ones
sniggered behind him. This was because the simmering rumours of cracks in his
marriage had hit home.
And though secretive in his ways, he knew it
was time to open up. And he did. “I do not know why my wife's siblings see me
as a gold digger. They confront me, harass and fight me in my own matrimony.
And my wife did nothing to stop them. I work hard, I earn my money. I have
never depended on my wife ", he lamented, eyes blurred with tears.
You could tell he was in deep pain. By the
next visit, the Saint returned with a deep cut from knife on his left eye. His
wife's brothers, he said, scaled the wall fence of their house to attack him.
They were captured by hidden closed-circuit television, CCTV, installed for surveillance and
security, he revealed.
He reported them at the police station and
subsequently acquired a gun to defend himself.
This effectively marked the beginning of the
end of his marriage and perhaps Saint Obi's long walk to a sad end. He moved
out of his marital home to a new house to begin the reconstruction of his
destiny, alone without his wife and worse still without his three beautiful
children.
Meanwhile, his wife went to the police to
defend her siblings using her financial power to manipulate the cause of
justice, Saint stated unequivocally. The wife also sued for divorce, not in
Lagos, but in Ogun State. As Saint put it, "It was to make the journey
difficult for me.
But I will not bend neither will I break. I
will fight with my last blood to take custody of my children. They love me and know it will be hard for me to live without them. The divorce is not an
issue. My marriage has long been over ", he said with a mix of courage and
a quaky heart that betrayed his distress.
About mid-last year, however, Obinna took
ill. But he told no one. He simply became scarce. He was in and out of
hospital, we would later learn. He sold two of his three big SUVs to take
proper care of his health and to acquire six Camry cars he'd use for Uber. But
his vanishing health continued unabated. He seemed to have a premonition of his
own passing as he wept repeatedly about not seeing his children.
He emaciated. Life took a grim picture. When
I saw him by chance in January 2023, the dude called Saint looked 15 years
older than his age. His macho cut had shrunk. His fat wallet was gone. What was
left was only his fat will. His eyes seemed lost in their socket. This would be
the last time I would see him.
Saint snuck out of Lagos to hang in with his
sister in Jos. He told no one.
But a month ago, in April precisely, the once
delightful actor who brought joy to many a home broke his icy silence. He
called our mutual friend in US to give him a devastating message. He was on a deathbed;
he said and wanted our friend to pray for him. “It’s not looking good, pray,
pray for me ", he appealed passionately.
His next call came on May 1, 2023. This time
to his mentor, the man who made him a star with his productions, Zeb Ejiro,
OON. He told him with a wavering voice
that he had had three surgeries but was still in hospital in Jos. He averred again that his situation was not
looking good, that he is also in a deep pain, distressed that he could not see
his children. But still, he begged him not to tell anyone about his ailment.
Such was the life of this creative hermit, a
lonely trouper.
I was the first to hear the news of his death
late on Sunday, May 7. Having confirmed it, I called Zeb Ejiro. “I have a very
bad news my brother, Zeb", I began.” What is it, what is it, “he asked
anxiously. "A big star has fallen
in Nollywood ". Zeb broke down in tears. I hadn't said who it was. But
sobbing helplessly now, he said, “Don’t tell me it is Saint Obi ". Sadly,
he was right. May his soul find peace?
Article by Zik Zulu Okafor
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