For the Nigerian prime thespian arts Nollywood industry, it has been a tale of sicknesses, deaths, and mourning over the last year.

Just as the delectable actress, Rachel Oniga, was being buried in Lagos on Friday after death from a heart-related disease, another prominent actor, Ifeanyi Dike, was announced to have given up the ghost due to a kidney condition.

Until his death, Dike, a prince, and veteran actor was the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Actors’ Guild of Nigeria (AGN), the regulatory body of actors and their profession in Nigeria.

Many stars have fallen en route their career trajectories, and it is now an object of muted worry as to where and when the unsparing grips of death would strike next.

One of the latest in the log is the demise of another veteran, Victor Olaotan, 69, over what family sources disclosed was a brain injury

The talented actor, better known for his lead character as Fred Ade-Williams in the popular, long-running soap opera movie series, Tinsel, died on Thursday in Lagos.

A colleague of the late actor, himself too, and a veteran, Demola Sanyaolu, broke the news to the world last week.

Olaotan born on 17th February 1952, died five years after a car accident that rested his career prospects.

He was driving to a movie set in October 2016 when he had an accident in Festac Town, Lagos.

The bill for his treatment was picked by billionaire businessman, Femi Otedola and others, for his treatment in Nigeria and Turkey.

Career

The late Olaotan began his career at age 15 as an actor when he joined the University of Ibadan theatre group, where he performed with other thespians as Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, eminent minstrel, Jimi Solanke, and others.

He had earlier been inspired by a schoolteacher who was a member of the Ori Olokun Theatre group in the early ’70s, prior to the demise of his father.

After his father died, he traveled to the United States of America in 1978 but returned to Nigeria in 2002 to continue his career in acting.

He became more popular in 2013 after his leading role in a Nigerian soap opera, Tinsel that began airing in August 2008.

Olaotan has to his credit, films like Towo Tomo, Lovestruck, Three Wise Men, Lotanna, Remember Me and Voiceless Scream.

Others
Olaotan’s demise updates the list of actors and actresses who have died over a year.

On February 17, 2020, popular actress, Patricia Oni drew the curtain. She reportedly died of stroke and ‘weight problems’.

It was the turn of veteran Nollywood producer, Chico Ejiro, on December 5, 2020.

Isoko, Delta State-born Chico Mozakpomo, a movie producer, screenwriter, and director before his death, held the enviable record of movie productions (over 85), by self-admission, with a period of three decades.

In January 2021, another actor, Ernest Azuzu, also bade the world farewell. Azuzu, who began his active acting career in the 90s, rose to prominence as a star in the 1997 Nollywood classic, ‘Rituals’.

His career, however, nose-dived after he cropped stroke in 2015, which hampered his speech.

Sadiq Daba, alias Bitrus in the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) drama series, ‘Cock Crow at Dawn’, kicked the bucket in March 2019.

He had expired on the strength of twin dangerous ailments, leukemia, and prostate cancer.

Before the death of talented actress, Rachel Oniga this month, another actor, Rich Oganiru, had fallen to the same fate of death.

Oganiru died after a few months of illness, in very pathetic circumstances.

Kano-Jigawa road for temporary closure Monday – FRSC

Career

His death was announced on the social medium platform, Facebook. However, two weeks before his death, his friend, EmstarVee, had pleaded for urgent help from well-wishers and philanthropists, with a picture of the actor lying on his sickbed trended.

When he died a few weeks after, the friend posted: “I’ve lost a good friend like a brother for years, a great Nollywood actor par excellence.

“I’m just speechless. R.I.P. Amb. Rich Oganiru’’.