Entertainment
Nollywood Actress, Belinda Effah Changes Name
Nollywood actress, Belinda Effah has revealed that she will now be officially known as Grace Charis Bassey. The actress recently announced this development on her Instagram page.
Speaking at the press conference held on the set of the ‘Nollywood Queens’ reality show Effah disclosed that she changed her name from Belinda Effah to Grace Charis Bassey. According to the actress, her divine encounter with God prompted the name change.
Her words:, “I had to change my name and the only thing that can make me change my name will be the most supreme being which is God. A lot of people will not understand that, so I don’t bother to explain to people when they ask me why. On the 5th of August last year, I had a divine encounter with God to change my name to Grace. Nobody changed my name, God did”.
“A couple of years ago, I wanted to change my name when I found out that I could not really grasp the meaning of my name. Some people said it meant beauty, some other people said it meant ‘beautiful serpent’, so I was caught in between not knowing what the real meaning is and I wasn’t quite comfortable with that. Also, Belinda was not the name my parents gave me.
My birth name is Uyu, I came across Belinda in secondary school, when my brother came up with the idea of changing my name and my sisters names because we were all bearing native names. He came up with different names and asked us to pick. Funnily enough, I picked Melinda but I didn’t like the name because people started calling me Mirinda in school. So I decided to just go with Belinda because they could not twist it to something funny like Mirinda, I didn’t check the meaning. I was just carried away because it sounded cool and funky”.
The Calabar, Cross River state-born beauty said she went soul searching after feeling stuck in life having fully grown.
R&B star, Temilade Openiyi, popularly known as Tems, has recounted the early-career challenges she faced, revealing that she was once booed out of the stage while performing at a school event.
Speaking in an interview with Newsmen, the Crazy Tings crooner shared that she wasn’t only booed but was also harassed with plastic bottles.
“I remember one time I was going to perform at my school as an up-and-coming singer and I thought I was going to receiving a standing ovation.
“But I got booed. They even threw plastic bottles at me,” she recalled.
Tems explained that despite the embarrassing incident and other such rejections, she remained determined to pursue a career in music.
The Tide Entertainment reports that Tems admitted that some of the initial rejections she faced could be due to her conviction to stick to her originality instead of doing covers or familiar sounds like most of her peers.
The Grammy-winning singer said looking back now, she is glad that she didn’t compromise her style despite the initial pressures.
A close associate of late singer Mohbad, Primeboy, has appealed for the artiste’s burial nearly three years after his death.
According to him, Mohbad’s body remains in the mortuary since September 12, 2023, pending burial arrangements.
The Tide Entertainment reports that in a statement Primeboy urged the family, public, and government to permit the burial, stating, “It’s been almost three years since Mohbad left us. His body is still in the mortuary. I’m begging the family, I’m begging the public, I’m begging the government, please let’s bury our brother. He deserves a befitting burial.”
It would be recalled that Mohbad’s death sparked public outrage, protests, and investigations. Ongoing autopsy examinations, police inquiries, and legal proceedings have delayed burial arrangements amid family disagreements and public scrutiny.
Nancy Briggs
