The injustice Ibinabo Fiberesima and Grace Amah meted out to me – Crystabel Goody
By Rita Chioma
Nollywood actress, Crystabel Goddy has finally opened up about what happened between her and Ibinabo Fiberesima.
In a recent interview, the actress, who had been labelled a Vampire actress expressed her grudge with Ibinabo and Grace Amah.
“I never had a relationship with the Actors Guild of Nigeria and I still don’t. I was very surprised when I heard that I had been banned by AGN. I’m not a member of the guild, so how could I have been banned by them? Even if I am a member of the guild, the ideal thing would have been to hear my side of the story before taking a decision. After all, it was a case of two people fighting. The fact that someone plays the victim doesn’t mean she’s innocent. And this is similar to what happened to the four UNIPORT students, who were gruesomely murdered in Aluu community. The person, who raised the alarm that they were thieves was actually the guilty one. But it seems justice in Nigeria has to do with who you know,” she said.
“Even when the storm was raging, some directors called me and told me to ignore Ibinabo that they would continue giving me jobs. However, I still went to meet Ibinabo with my lawyer. When she heard my side of the story, she told me that even she couldn’t put up with Princess’ overbearing attitude. She said that if she was the one, she may have even reacted more. She later took me to meet some of the trustees of AGN and they promised that they were going to lift the ban. Based on legal advice, I was told to remain silent about the whole issue but I now think that was a mistake because I’m not someone who backs down easily.”
“When Ibinabo was pronounced guilty by the court for her murder case; I granted an interview that she was probably suffering from the consequence of placing an underserved ban on me. Grace Amah then came out to utter some gibberish. I have no problem with anybody for standing up for their friends but do it in truth. Grace didn’t even have all the facts of the case before coming out to say all she said. The reaction from Nigerians also made me know that people are gullible and nobody really cares about you. But even though they tried to put me down, I will still rise because I’m a survivor. I’m also thankful to the faction of AGN that was sensible enough to lift the ban. I have never met Emeka Ike but I’m glad that he was considerate enough to do the right thing.”
On her relationship with Chineke at the moment:
“I don’t know what has become of her. I tried to apologise to her regardless of the fact that she also inflicted injuries on me. She also caused me a lot of emotional pain but she refused to accept my apology. My mum spoke with her mother but they remained adamant. She took me to court and the case is still on. The magistrate also asked her if she was going to forgive me if I apologised and she said she wouldn’t. Friendship is a two-way street and I would rather watch my back than force friendship. Someone who can put you out thinking they can break you because they see a promising career ahead of you is capable of anything. Playing the victim to gain sympathy from gullible people over a fight she played a major role in and also inflicting scars on me is evil. Anyway, I thank God for how the case is going and there have been only few cases of great folks, who did not face litigation. Even despite the ban, though the jobs were slow, but here I am. The jobs that didn’t come were certainly the ones that I didn’t need.”
