Veteran singer Onyeka Onwenu shares what it means to be phenomenal

“Indeed, Onwenu’s life is a worthy novel. Her absolute belief in her capability to do anything she conceives and resilience which she has become known for was gotten from her parents”.

She says that having experienced love as a daddy’s girl especially as one “who is unapologetically in love with his daughter,” she has had the chance to flourish and developed at a young age, self-assurance that she can rule the world.

Losing her Dad at a Young Age

Having lost her father, Dickson Kanu Onwenu, at age 4 and 10 months, she says that learning from her mother, Hope Onwenu certain behavioural patterns, has made her the confident woman that she is.

“It gave me the confidence that I had a right to be myself, I had a right to speak my truth but also gave me a certain grounding in behavioural patterns, for example, you see an adult and you don’t greet? Who born you? So there were character traits that were instilled in us [her and her siblings] by this very strong woman who had lost her second husband at age 37 and didn’t marry again”.

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Despite living at a time when the art was not appreciated by the average Nigerian parent, she holds her mother responsible for the persistent encouragement to pursue her music career.

On her return to Nigeria in 1980, she took up a job first as a National Youth Service Corps (NBS) member and earned her place as a courageous reporter with the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA).

First Album Release

In 1981, Onwenu became a household name after the release of her first album, Endless Life produced by Sunny Okosun. Endless Life gave Nigerians a new perception of the reporter.

The Queen of African Pop would go on in later years to release For the Love of You, In the Morning Light, One Love, Dancing in the Sun, Onyeka, Greatest Love, My Everything God and “The Legend”.

Fearless Documentary

Three years later [1984], Nigeria felt the empathy and the sting (for the government) of Onwenu after she released her fearless documentary for BBC/NTA, Nigeria: A Squandering of Riches.

This documentary would change the course of Nigerians’ view on corruption and the environmental degradation of the oil-rich regions forever.

On the lining of these successes are drawbacks that she has accepted. She was barred from 7 states owing to the documentary,

“For many many years, I couldn’t go to some parts of the country. For many years, people would see me and say, ‘Oh, this, that’ but it has lessened a bit because all the things we talked about 35-36 years ago are still relevant today.

Some of us have been vindicated what we tried to point out then if we have been listened to, things would have been different and I am very sad that that film is still relevant till today.

“In the Igbo language we say, ọkenye fu ihe ojọọ, okwuro, ọ alụ [when an elder sees something going wrong and doesn’t say anything, it is an abomination]”

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Onyeka the Humanitarian and Activist

Anyone who thought that the haunt will stop her is not familiar with her story. In 2000, Onwenu went on a one-man protest and a hunger strike outside the gates of the NTA Channel 5 over the station’s refusal to pay royalties on her song earning her again, the accolades from other artistes who in turn, took turns to join in.

Her critically acclaimed song, Iyogogo, was used as one of the station’s idents. Rather than pay her, she was blacklisted from the transmission.

Unfortunately, the media is not only responsible for the last statement. For someone who paid her mother, Mrs Hope Onwenu, for using her song, Ochie Dike Nnem, Onwenu decried the actions of the new generation artistes to the old.

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“When I recorded that song, I actually paid her for her copyright, then I took her song and moulded it into my own. My mother sang in the original song, she did some rapping and did some spoken word.”

Paving The Way for Future Artistes

“The younger artistes who are now enjoying the huge amounts of money that they are making from the music industry have really not said thank you to those of us who worked, protested, went on strike, spent extra hours, our own money organising our unions and even getting barred from airplay.”

“When Sony Music, CBS, Polygram, Ivory Music left Nigeria, it was people like me, Sunny Ade, Christin Igbokwe, Sunny Okosun that started music companies and began investing in the industry and that is how the music industry survived.”

Asides this, for a generation that so desperately wants to copy the western music videos, her lyrical content and videos are on the downside. Unclad girls dominate videos that do not necessarily command rave reviews while the lyrics are filled with little or no content. “Why do you think that people keep going back to old school? You weren’t just entertained, you went home with something.”

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Women Empowerement

In this, Onwenu opines that women should put on some self-worth and also demand that men should strip if they must.

Onwenu is a proud human activist with an impressive profile to show for it. With the odds stacked against her, first as a woman, and then as a fighter, she opines when we talk about the argument on what achievement really means for a woman in modern-day society, that a woman should define what achievement means and live it.

“For many years, Nigerians never knew that I got married and had a family because I chose not to talk about marriage, I chose not to answer Mrs so and so. My children answer their father’s name and I, my father’s name because I married a man who, thank God, understands because I would not have changed. It’s not man and marriage are not important but I don’t want to be defined by it.”

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Source & picture credits: guardian.ng