…AND JENNIFER MADIKE DIES ON VALENTINE’S DAY
Nothing lasts forever; as the seasons turn, so does human life wither to age and disease, everything vanishes like morning dew. This grim reality currently benumbs the hearts of Jennifer’s family members.
Jennifer is dead. But tragic as her demise is, her family, friends and other loved ones may seek consolation in the fact that even in death, the infinitely generous woman has gone on to join the heavenly choir invisible of the immortal dead; the souls who pass on but continue to live in minds and lives made better by their presence.
Yes, Jennifer became born again before she died. She was even a Pastor at Spirit and Life Bible Church with headquarters in Benin City
Without doubt, her death once again emphasizes the fleetingness and fragility of human life. No one would forget so easily, Jennifer Madike, the popular drug baroness in the 80s. She was once notable for living out loud but no sooner than the NDLEA started querying and clamping down on moneybags whose sources of money seemed suspicious, Jennifer beat a hasty retreat from the fast lane. It would be recalled that she painted the town red and rocked every city she visited to the hilt back then when she traversed the fast lane in the 80s. Jennifer partied hard and wild at home and abroad. She remained prime favourite of high society as the society courted her and local artistes sang her praises endlessly, until she passed away some days ago. The story of lovegone-sour between the then chairman of National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Fidelis Oyakhilome, and Jennifer, generated interest nationwide between 1990 and 1991. The incident that felled Oyakhilome from his Olympian height was his alleged complicity with Jennifer, in offering bailout to drug barons under the influence of Jennifer’s undue closeness to him is well documented in the media. The specific banana peel upon which Oyakhilome stepped and tripped, as it were, was the case of a suspected drug baron, Gregory Odilibe, whom the NDLEA had declared wanted over drug offences. The anti-drug agency under Oyakhilome had placed a newspaper advertisement, declaring Odilibe wanted. But before then, series of events had thrown up delicately pretty, suave and charming Jennifer as a special friend of the NDLEA boss.