“He always spoke in codes that took me days to decode. Before she could give a response to his advances, Munachi noted that Mr Gee began groping her in the presence of other girls. She needed to do one thing -– love him back. He adjusted his shorts, dusted the cement slab Munachi and the reporter sat on, and joined the conversation.Ĭontinuing, Munachi said Mr Gee said he loved her and wanted to take her to London for the London Fashion Week of 2016. One of her brothers, who connected Saturday PUNCH to Munachi via Twitter, decided to sit in through the rest of the interview. This reporter opted to leave and return later the next day, but Munachi said she wanted to get it ‘over and done with’. Her brothers came around and sat beside her, patting her back. That man did everything to make sure I survived but look at me,” she said and broke down in tears. I felt my dad would be turning in his grave. The next day they met at the rehearsal, Munachi said Mr Gee looked at her differently, making her uncomfortable. Two days later, Munachi said she sent the pictures to him and he called to thank her hours later. She called, but she said he refused to answer her calls. It was frustrating,” she said.Īfter the silence, she said Mr Godwin texted her that she had less than 24 hours to send the pictures or she would lose the job. The next time we had rehearsals, he refused to say anything to me or give me transport fare like he used to do. I called him back but he refused to pick up. “I asked him what the job was and he got angry and hung up. How will I do that without getting caught? I slept in the same room with my mother since my dad’s death and my brothers slept in the sitting room. I was just a little bit confused about the so-called job they all had been talking about,” Munachi said, keeping an expressionless face.Īfter days of endless rehearsals, she said Mr Gee called her up one night and asked her to take snapshots of her breasts and private parts for him to see, claiming that he needed them for a ‘job’ he was working to get Munachi on. “She kept stressing that we were lucky to be the chosen ones to do the job as there were many girls begging them to be here. She recalled that one of the ladies there, whom they all knew as Ms Vee, kept telling them that they would need to train well first before they would be given their first job. But, I loved the way the other girls made me feel so I continued. “When I got home that day, I told my mum and she told me to stop going there. Each of them got a commission for bringing any girl there for the ‘job’ they had planned for us. It was later on I knew that all of us there were commodities to these people. I kept hearing ‘my cut, your cut’ and the like, and I was confused. “I really cannot recall now what the argument was about but I know it had something to do with money. “All of us who were young, between 15 and 18,” she noted.Īfter waiting for more than three hours, Munachi said two more girls joined them at the venue and the casting began, adding that Mr Gee came in a few minutes before the end of the process and an argument erupted between the organisers of the ‘event’. The first day Munachi went to the casting centre – or what looks like it – in Ikoyi, Lagos, she met only four girls her age and two girls a year older. I didn’t know this man had other plans,” she added, increasing her tone with every breath. “I told my mum about it and she sounded skeptical but I told her it was just to pose for pictures because that was what Mr Godwin told me. She said Mr Gee told her he ran a modelling agency and wanted her to be one of his models, promising to pay her N10,000 for every gig.įresh out of secondary school at the time and unemployed, Munachi said she decided to take the offer. Moreover, I was just 17,” she added with a broken smile and readjusted her gaze towards her brothers. “I was confused because I did not understand why anyone will want to do that to a stranger. This man followed me to the akara spot, waiting for me to finish, and offered to pay. “He kept shouting ‘fine girl, fine girl’ so, I felt it was one of these men who were trying to woo me. That morning, Munachi said she had gone out to buy some akara (bean cake) for her sick mother when Godwin, aka Mr Gee, accosted her. She lifted her head, looked at this reporter, and sat up. I was young,” she said, with a strange urgency in her voice. He said he worked with a modelling agency and wanted me to be a model. “I was 17 (years old) when Mr Godwin (surname withheld) saw me.
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