Veteran Nollywood actress, Taiwo Ajayi-Lycett opens up about her turbulent past and how she survived rape at the age of 65. The actress bears it all in a recent interview with THE NATION.
Ajayi- Lycetts‘s challenges began when she became a mother at 15.
Where it all started
“I have been through the fire, I emerged fortified. I was 15 years old when I had a child. By 16, I was on my own, I knew I was going to be a lawyer. But I knew I was on my own. My father disowned me. They thought I gave them a bad name because I got pregnant. It was a big deal then.”
Her dream of being sponsored by her father was short lived when he insisted that the man who got her pregnant, Adebanji Adefolaju must marry her and he agreed. And then, tragedy struck. Adefoluja perished in the Lalupon train disaster on September 29, 1957. Leaving Ajayi-Lycett with a one year old Adebowale Adefoluja (Her son).
Yet again, her father insisted he was not going to waste a dime on her education after she needed to school to keep her new job as an assistant teacher at St. Paul’s Catholic School, Costain.
“He said he couldn’t foot the bills for me to go and get pregnant again. Nobody trusted me,” she said.
In her quest for a better life, the situation prompted her to accept an offer from David Akinduro in 1959, who asked if she could come to England and marry him. After her father refused to give consent, Ajayi-Lycett who was tired of being a maid in her father’s house damned the consequences and set out for a new life in the UK.
Things got really bad when she soon found out her second husband, Akinduro was an abusive, entitled and manipulative man.
Life after divorce
After she called it quits with the marriage, things took a new turn.
“I met Lycett long after I divorced my first. By the time I met him, I was studying to get a Law degree and my acting career was in full swing.”
She made her acting debut in December 1966, in Wole Soyinka‘s The Lion and the Jewel. Eventually, she married Thomas Lycett in between a stage production. But she lost him when she was 52 years, They were married for 25 years, one she tagged ‘blissful‘.
Robbed and raped
The idea of coming to Nigeria came from Thomas Lycett. Ajayi-Lycett came home to rebuild, teach people and share her acting gift.
Tragedy struck again in 2006, she was robbed and rapped in her house where she also ran a school in Egbe. Describing the horrible experience, she revealed;
“I was blindfolded and raped. The man who raped me complained that he couldn’t gain easy entry into me because I was wet. I told him ‘widows don’t get wet.’ I kept talking to them and asked them repeatedly, ‘Are you doing this to your mother?’ Angrily, they taped my mouth but I remained fearless and prayed all through the attack.”
After the incident, she shut down the school and left Egbe.
Speaking on the reason for the robbery, she said her staff orchestrated the attack because they felt she was too strict. Even though they were stealing from her and tried to take over her business.
Moving on to new beginnings
Despite her horrible challenges, Ajayi-Lycett has not let it define her. She stands tall today with features in notable Nigerian films including Oloibiri, Tinsel, Dazzling Mirage, The Inheritors and Hear word, among others.
She advises her fans to forgive and move on irrespective of the situation. In her words:
“Look at me today, I am over it. See the mind is a beautiful thing. When you hold on to your past, you tie yourself down to grief. You get infected with its poison. Rather than wallow in grief and self-pity, I picked myself up and sought medical help, ensuring that they hadn’t infected me with any STD. Then I moved on. That same year the Olusegun Obasanjo government got me the Officer of the Order of Niger (OON) national honour.“
