For dethroned Miss Anambra, Chidimma Blessing Okeke, it was perhaps a journey filled with thorns and snare. She may have had a tall dream of moving to the top through beauty contests but alas, her dreams have been cut short through the release of an obscene video where she was filmed nude in a lesbian act with another girl, Ada, who is alleged to be the third runner up in Miss Democracy contest, and her Personal Assistant.

It was gathered from Chidimma’s mother, Lady Nora Okeke that the former beauty queen performed the act under the influence of something which she could not ascertain. In her words, “As a mother watching the video broke my heart but I have stopped crying and committed everything into the hands of God who always fights my battle. When I spoke with my daughter, I asked her what led her into such unholy act despite having brought her up in a godly way, she in tears said, ‘Mommy even if I did it, I didn’t know when it was done honestly, am surprised and confused. I don’t know what happened mommy’.”

Responding to the question of supporting their daughter to take part in the pageant, the mother said that “Chidimma had come home to say she was going to take part in the Miss Anambra Pageant and I discouraged her from it telling her to use her beauty for God. She went back to school and returned again later to say she had been selected amongst the final contestants. I can never support any of my children to take part in any beauty pageant because we are a Christian family and don’t have liking for such things. Chidimma went into the pageant without our knowledge but she is a little girl and we cannot throw her away, she remains my little babe and the baby of the house. When she won, it was her sister that called up to tell us. She is my last child and she came seven years after my sixth child.

“Chidimma was simply porn in the hands of both the organisers of Miss Anambra and her former manager hence things went awry when she decided to free herself from the bondage. The entire controversy affected my daughter because when I went to see her, she had emaciated so much and not looking after herself at all, when I asked her why her hair was so scattered, she said, ‘Mommy leave that hair alone, that’s not my worry’. My prayer is that they will not kill my daughter.”

The smoke to the dethroning of Miss Anambra may have started building up when she decided to break away from the clutches of her manager who the family did not name. In an interview with Chidimma’s father, Sir Jeremiah Okeke, he said he didn’t want to dwell in the controversy anymore as the deed had already been done and cannot be reversed.

“I have embraced prayers and seeking the face of God and I know in no distant time he will expose the people behind all this. They have rubbished my daughter and my family name but my God will fight my battle, I trust Him and he has never failed me. How can a beauty queen be borrowing money to pay her driver, where is it done? Why was the crown taken away from her three to five months before the due date for another queen to emerge? Why was I called and told to declare my daughter missing by the managing Director of ABS? A man does not say all that he has seen…leave that thing alone, God will expose the truth soon.

“This MD is neither known to me nor my wife. Then he calls me to suggest I declare my daughter missing? My response to him on the phone was; ‘you say I should declare my own daughter Chidimma missing? OK, I have heard you’ and I dropped the phone.”

Further details gathered from Chidimma’s father reveal that the dethroned queen was not even paid the full amount of N1 million which she won while she was made to share every penny she made while reigning as a beauty queen until she couldn’t contain it anymore and she was advised to take her complaints to the person who is currently managing her. It was that tears of a drowning queen that made the current manager to move in to take control. The takeover it was alleged did not go down well with the former manager who called to query her on that move describing it as a wrong move to make.

How the Car Was Taken From Her

According to the embattled queen’s father, “Chidimma was with her elder sister when she was called to come to the ABS office with her car for a function only for her to return shortly in tears and the elder sister asked to know what happened, she said that ‘When she got to ABS, she was asked to hand over the keys of the car, which she did and before she left, she was shown a video of herself in an immoral act and she broke down in tears but was asked to leave. God has finished the fight for me because I as an adult cannot even contain that kind of shock. It’s amazing how my daughter was able to leave that place and remained sane not to have thrown herself at an oncoming vehicle to die or commit suicide. Anybody that can do that kind of a thing does not mean well.

“I thank God that my daughter is recovering, I was with her yesterday (Monday 7th) though she is still in shock but it will all pass and I can’t wait for the truth to be exposed.”

Reacting to Chidimma’s father’s statement, the Managing Director of ABS, Nze Uche Nworah, denied ever calling the man on phone saying that he does not have access to the man’s number neither have they met.

He said, “That’s a lie, I never spoke with Chidimma’s father and I have never met him in person. I hope he is not confusing me with somebody else. The ABS management which is the management that is handling the Miss Anambra pageant has followed the binding contract to the latter. If you can access Chidimma, ask her to show you the contract which she signed and her sister’s husband signed on behalf of the father. I never called her father at any time; I am not even supposed to be responding to what the man is saying but for the sake of clarity.”

When a call was put across to Chidimma’s father to react to Uche Nworah’s denial, he simply condemned the management’s uncaring attitude towards knowing who the beauty queen’s parents were. Despite the many accusations and counter accusation, only Chidimma may for now hold the ace to unraveling the entire truth. The popular thinking is that the act, which she took part in will remain a stigma shrouding her very essence but it is left for her to amend her ways and take the part of righteousness while absconding from fame. Her scandal is also a huge lesson for other youths who may be nursing the ambition of getting into pageants to learn to hold their integrity and follow the right part no matter the pressure.

For some people, Chidimma may have walked into her shame with her eyes open but without any inkling that she was programming her destruction while another group are opinion that she may have been drugged before the act only for the tape to be used as a way to hold her hostage and sway her around for the gains of her blackmailers. However, another small circle are of the view that Chidimma should be made to serve a jail sentence as the nation’s constitution frowns at lesbianism and gay act.

It was gathered that her phone was taken away from her shortly after the video went viral to avoid being bombarded by the media with calls and in the process say what may come back to haunt her. Until the truth is unearthed, it remains to be known if Chidimma, the dethroned Miss Anambra (2015) was a lesbian, drugged to perform the act or if she performed an act out of her freewill perhaps because of the gains attached to it. For now she remains in hiding and only her parents can tell where she is.

The two-day journey through the very lonely tarred road to the small town of Ogboji to get the version of the parents, who are visibly distraught from the scandal, may have not come easy but it gives an insight into the root of the embattled beauty queen, a middle class, quiet and friendly family who believe in nothing but God. For the father, “My family planned on keeping the news from me because I’m hypertensive but I was later told and it won’t kill me. I have seen worse things during my time in business, let God continue to fight my battle.”

•Photo shows former Miss Anambra, Chidimma Blessing Okeke.

Update news