‘We danced together’ — Joke Silva details last moment with Onyeka Onwenu

Joke Silva, the veteran actress, has revealed her last moments with Onyeka Onwenu, the ace singer. 

Onwenu collapsed at the 80th birthday party of Stella Okoli, founder of Emzor Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Company, on July 30 after she had performed. She was confirmed dead at Reddington Hospital in Lagos.

The singer’s service of songs was held last Friday morning at the Fountain of Life Church, Ilupeju, and was attended by prominent figures including Peter Obi, the presidential candidate, and Alex Otti, Enugu state governor.

She was buried at the Ebony Vaults in Ikoyi, Lagos on August 30.

Narrating her final moments with Onwenu in a recent interview on WithChude, Silva said she and the late singer danced together during her last performance.

The film star also revealed that moments after Onwenu performed her hit song ‘One Love’, she slumped on her chair.

Silva said medical personnel at the event tried to revive her. She said the actress passed away at the hospital after nearly two hours.

“We were at the party together at the same table. At some point while she was performing when she was going around the room, she came to me. You know, I’m a super armchair dancer. I don’t like getting up to dance, but I love dancing on my chair, and she was performing, and I was enjoying her performance and was dancing to it. So she just came round the room to where I sat and pulled me up, and we had a bit of a twirl,” she said.

“She was singing ‘One Love’ and close to the song I went back to my seat and she also went back to her seat. And it was when I looked across that I heard Shola Momoh saying ‘she’s not well. She slumped on her chair’. But then she was just unconscious. She had an impulse.

“CPR was performed while she was laid down on the floor. We tried to revive her. We asked for doctors in the house to come and look at her and they did. Later on, I went to the hospital. And she was there for about one and half hours before she finally passed.”

Abraham and Tijani Ogunlende, the sons of the late singer, earlier revealed that the doctors “made every effort to save her life”.

Obi, the Labour Party presidential candidate during the 2023 election, also recalled how Onwenu collapsed after performing at the event where he was also present.