My father rejected my education because of my gender – Eucharia Anunobi

Eucharia Anunobi (Nigerian actress and film producer)

 Veteran actress and evangelist Eucharia Anunobi recently shared the personal struggles she faced with her father, who she says tried to block her education and career dreams because of her gender.

Speaking on The Honest Bunch Podcast, the Nollywood star explained that her father viewed educating a daughter as a "waste of money." His reasoning was rooted in the outdated belief that since a girl eventually marries and takes her husband’s last name, she wouldn't carry on her own family’s legacy.

“My father was against me going to school. It was a thing of displeasure for him. From secondary school, he made it clear that he was not interested in my education,” she said.

She shared that her father often argued that educating a daughter was a waste of resources.

“As a matter of fact, what is in a girl child? What legacy would it leave except that they are only going to get married. So please, cut them off from me,” she quoted him as saying.

Since her father refused to pay for her school, she turned to modeling to earn the money she needed to fund her own education.

“That was how I began my journey and it encouraged me into modelling. It was modelling that sustained, fuelled and financed my education. Yes, my father was wealthy in his own terms, but he did not want to have anything to do with the girl child,” she said.

Anunobi revealed the extreme lengths her father went to: he once kept her locked in her room for six months because she turned down an office job he had picked out for her.

“For six months, my father locked me in my room. There is the small white paper they call ‘use me’ paper — he would write an employment letter and push it under my door so I could fill the form and we could submit it,” she said.

However, she insisted on pursuing a different path.

“But I would write back that I don’t want to work in an office. My mum would be crying and they would be giving me food like a criminal for six months in my own father’s house,” she added.

Anunobi shared that she was entirely self-sufficient until university, as her father refused to pay a dime for her schooling until she reached that level.

“In his mind, I was a waste. He didn’t pay my fees till university, and after I struggled to make my university education possible, he wanted to lord over me, but I refused. All those acting jobs I did then, I used to sneak out to go and do them,” Anunobi said.