Sex streaming saga: Iwuji now on the spot

 

Uche Iwuji

Another celebrity finds herself entangled in a fresh sex-related scandal, Jayne Augoye writes

 A few weeks ago, fast rising singer, Chidinma Ekile, was in the news after a sex tape allegedly belonging to her went viral on the Internet. The young woman denied having anything to do with the video.

While admitting the girl in the video bore little resemblance to her, the music reality show product, noted that some mischief makers wanted to discredit her and tarnish her image.

Currently, Nollywood actress, Uche Iwuji, is fighting hard to clear her name after a nude picture, which first went public five years ago re-surfaced online this month.

The image, currently trending on the social media, is at the centre of a rumoured breakup of Uche’s one-year-old marriage to businessman Juwon Lawal. But the light skinned actress and her husband has since denied the rumour.

Reminding her ‘detractors’ in a series of tweets that the picture in question, which was circulated online about five years ago, when she was still new in Nollywood, the actress said, “For your information my hubby has seen the picture before ever meeting me. So if you don’t have anything to talk about please wish people well.

“This same picture has been around for a long time even before I met my hubby, so why will such a thing wanna crash my marriage?

“I laugh at some stupid people saying my nude picture crashed my marriage! My hubby and I are still together so you all get a life! I am out of here.”

Also reacting to the rumour in a recent interview granted to a Lagos tabloid, Uche’s husband told the tale bearers that his marriage was still intact. “Our marriage has crashed? That’s very strange. I am hearing it for the first time. Anyway, I don’t even have time to be reading all those rubbish. I don’t have time for Tales by Moonlight,” he said.

 With the arrival of the new media, it is no more easy  for celebrities and to ‘control’ sensitive information about themselves in the public domain.

Perhaps it is also safe to assume that when the news about Uche’s nude picture initially spread like wildfire a few years ago, the actress did not have the opportunity to deny it for many reasons. This is partly due to the fact that access to the Internet and smart phones were beyond the reach of the ordinary Nigerian.

Today, the actress is privileged to respond to queries from fans, state her own side of the story and also fight back.

On the flip side, the social media has not been ‘fair’ to other artistes who have fallen victim to these ‘image tarnishing’ trend.

The story of yet another Nollywood actress, Anita Hogan, readily comes to mind.

Unlike Uche, Anita’s image were explicit. The dark-skinned actress, who has since risen above the challenge, told her own side of the story in an interview with The PUNCH last year. She said,“My fiancée and I were just having fun and toying with the camera. He snapped me and I snapped him. The photographs were downloaded onto my laptop. The laptop crashed and was taken for repairs. I think that is how the pictures got into the wrong hands.”

Other celebrities, such as Wizkid, Empress Njamah, Wande Coal, and David O, to mention but a few, have at one time or the other had cause to deny or manage sex related scandals.

In 2010, Wande Coal’s nude photographs found their way to Twitter before spreading to other social media sites. The following year, Empress Njamah went through a similar ordeal. She was allegedly linked with a nude photo on the social media at the time.

 Determined to prove that she had nothing to do with the picture, the controversial actress went as far as announcing a N2m reward for anyone that could provide information leading to the arrest of the person who had posted it online.

Also, popular crossover actor, Yomi Solade, had his own fair share of bad press after a photograph allegedly showing his private organs found its way to popular blogs and Facebook. In the same year, Wizkid was briefly entangled in a sex tape scandal that nearly ruined his budding career.

The year 2011, no doubt, was riddled with celebrity scandals as pop singer,  Mo’Cheddah, had to contend with a scandal revolving around a nude photo, which she allegedly sent to fellow musician, El Dee.