Omotola: Why I didn’t mourn when my father died

Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde, Nollywood actress, says she could not mourn when her father died because his demise left her “numbed and emotionless.”

The movie star brought the revelation to light during the latest episode of #WithChude wherein she reflected on how losing her father at 12 left her shattered.

Omotola said her strong relationship with her dad suffered a blow when she was taken to a Kaduna school away from home shortly after the birth of her younger brother.

“When I was about nine years old, I was shipped to Command Secondary School in Kaduna. By that time, they had just given birth to my younger brother. I was a child and I did not take it well at all,” she said.

“I even remember when he was leaving and we both were crying. It really affected me – I thought the reason was because he now had other kids, and I was no longer important to him.

“I think everything I have been, positively or negatively, was solely because of my father’s death. It affected me so much; I did not even know how much at the time. I did not even mourn my dad.”

The ace actress said her father breathed his last at a time when she was excited about returning home from school to spend more time with him.

“At the age of 12, I was becoming a little lady, and I was excited to spend time with my father. That was when I got called out of school because I needed to be home. I knew someone had died because of how everyone in school was tiptoeing around me. The only thing I kept saying at the airport was, ‘I just hope it is not my dad,” she added.

“For some callous reason, I was okay with it being anyone but him. When I got home, I was greeted by a crowd. As I walked into the house, I was thinking about which of my family members had died. I saw my brothers, then I saw my mum, and, at that moment, I froze because I knew it was my dad that had died.

“I’m not sure if it was the guilt of wishing death on someone else, and not him, or because I was too young to process it or because I was still angry with him for shipping me off, but I was numb and emotionless, and it has affected me to this day. It was like something died in me.”