My kids got death threats during #EndSARS — Actress Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde

My kids got death threats during #EndSARS — Actress Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde

Veteran Nollywood actress Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde has discovered that her toddlers acquired dying threats in the course of the 2020 #EndSARS protests, a development that pressured her to basically rethink her method to activism.

talking on Channels television’s Rubbin’ Minds on Sunday, February eight, the actress with a 3-decade career stated, “i’m used to demise threats; i’ve received them many times. however i’ve by no means seen whatever like what passed off at some point of #EndSARS. It was once excessive. My children began getting dying threats. That was when it have become bizarre.”

Jalade-Ekeinde, who was once actively involved in the motion—protesting at the Lekki Toll Gate and engaging in worldwide advocacy with media and NGOs—described the period as the maximum excessive backlash she has ever faced. The situation escalated past on line threats. “when humans commenced coming bodily to my home and place of job to search for me, I knew I needed to worry about different human beings and no longer just myself,” she said.

This personal danger to her own family prompted a strategic shift. “I agree with i’ve been an activist all my lifestyles… but while [my children] were given older, I had to restrategise. i’m able to’t manipulate wherein they go… and that i don’t need my kiddies to grow to be victims of alternatives that i’ve made,” she explained. “It was the ENDSARS revel in that made it clean that I needed to restrategise. as opposed to bodily activism, I moved fully into advocacy.”

Her involvement during #EndSARS used to be additionally marked by means of public controversy. Following the shootings at the Lekki Toll Gate on October 20, 2020, Jalade-Ekeinde faced sizable backlash for a tweet that advised, “if no person died, human beings must prevent sensationalising” the event, as it “does not put off from the crime that passed off.” Many Nigerians observed the remark insensitive and perceived it as thinking the confirmed deaths on the scene.

She later apologized, clarifying that she did not doubt the lack of existence and used to be trying to keep the point of interest at the atrocity itself. The #EndSARS motion, which protested police brutality by way of the disbanded unique Anti-robbery Squad (SARS), stays a pivotal moment in current Nigerian records, with lots of its needs for justice and police reform nonetheless unfulfilled.