My wife is no flirt Ekeinde, Omotola’s husband.

•Omotola and husband … marital vows strong It was obvious from the manner Mr. Ekeinde, pilot, sounded, that he was pained and frustrated by all the unfounded rumours about his wife's glorious outing at the Grammys "My brother, I am very proud of my wife's accomplishments and I join other well wishers and millions of her fans to toast her success. I'm a little surprised that instead of Nigerians celebrating her appearance at the Grammys and her being the first Nollywood star to walk the red carpet, they are busy spreading tales and rumours that do not exist"', he said. "Truth be told, I was not angry with my wife when I saw the picture. Why should I be? I know who I married, how self-respecting she is and also the nature of her industry. She is an actress for God's sake, and it is not out of place for actresses to appear in scenes that may look a little out of place for a married person.

''The key thing is that my wife respects her marital status, and in our 15-year-marriage, she has been the best woman any man could aspire to have. In spite of her stardom, at home, she is my wife. She cooks for me, takes care of the home and, above all, is a great mother to our lovely children. "I sincerely would implore her fans not to buy into rumours and speculations about her marital life, because I, the husband, the one that is lucky to have her as my wife, am so proud of her and I continue to thank God for bringing her into my life. I could never have asked for a better wife than her." Now, let me address the point she made that she did not grant an interview to Sunday Vanguard. About six weeks ago, I became a columnist in this newspaper.

And since one of the planks of this column rests on popular culture, I have been publishing AUTHENTIC AND CREDIBLE interviews that I have had with leading personalities over the years. There is no ethical kerfuffle involved with this practice. A writer or journalist who did an interview with a given subject can use same interview in any other credible media platform of his choosing, as long as the said INTERVIEW WAS PROPERLY CONDUCTED AND THE STORY IS REPORTED ACCURATELY.

That was what I did, with the Omotola story. She granted me an interview, and I am now a columnist with Sunday Vanguard, a very credible and easily one of the leading mainstream newspapers in Nigeria, and I decided to use the story, with my byline boldly displayed, which should suffice. Her story is not the first I had done along this line, which, I may add, is a universally adopted practice by journalists all over the world. Journalists are free to syndicate their stories in whatever medium or platform they deem fit.

For three weeks, I ran an interview I did with Her Excellency, Mrs. Bianca Ojukwu, the beautiful and erudite Nigerian Ambassador to the Kingdom of Spain last year in her home, in Enugu. When I did the interview, I was not yet a columnist with Sunday Vanguard, but I exercised my editorial judgment and used it to flag off this column. Call from Bianca When the interview ran in Sunday Vanguard, Her Excellency, Mrs. Bianca Ojukwu, had called me, while I was on a quick trip to South Beach, Miami, Florida, about three weeks ago, to commend me on the interview and even told me she couldn't get a copy of Sunday Vanguard in the entire eastern states because the paper sold out. She called me from New York where she had gone for a socio-cultural event and I told her that I was now doing a column in Sunday Vanguard and she wished me
well.

Mrs. Ojukwu did not deny the interview on the account that the said interview was not meant to have been published in this paper; she knew that the interview had the full complement of my integrity and professional bonafides, and was happy for me. In the weeks to come, I will use other exclusive interviews I did with other popular figures in our politics and pop culture worlds on these pages. Omotola my friend Omotola is my friend and even at this very strange moment of our friendship, I will still count her as a good friend. She has been a great ambassador of our arts and a role model for millions of women and I will not excoriate or eviscerate her, even though I am so massively tempted to get REAL ANGRY and to use the American street slang "wild-out" but I will hold my fire for NOW.

I count myself as one of the standard bearers of this genre of journalism and thus, acutely aware of ethical issues and concerns. I was trained at City University of New York, Queens College Department of Journalism by the same faculty members who taught students at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism and my