I USED TO TREK FROM YABA TO NTA IN VICTORIA ISLAND EVERYDAY – ALI BABA

Atunyota Alleluya Akporobomemerere may sound gibberish, but those who are conversant with AliBaba’s jokes would have heard him make fun of his own name. Like many successful people, the comedian has gone through ‘hell’ to be where he is today. And despite his stardom and a well-deserved title as the Godfather of Nigerian Comedy, he remains humble and open to many. Hazeez Balogun, met up with him, and he spoke about his tough life as an upstart.

You were asked to ring the bell to signal the close the year’s trading at the stock market, how do you feel about that?

It’s a great honour to have been selected by the council of the Nigerian Stock Exchange to be the one to ring the closing bell of trading for the year 2012, on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange. It is an honour to all comedians.

You have always talked about your father never being in support of your career choice, how was that like?

I came to Lagos to do comedy in 1999. It’s all about the passion. Once upon a time I chose to pursue a career in comedy, it was in contrast to my father’s dream for me. He wanted me to be a lawyer but I wanted to do comedy and I was passionate about it. Consequently, when he realised I wouldn’t budge, my dad rejected and abandoned me.

Is it true you had been performing and earning money from in school?

Yes I was. When I was in the university, I suspected that comedy was going to bring me a lot of money because my allowance at that time was N120 and when I did shows in school, I was paid N50. After I left school, I was already earning up to N150. So, I knew it would get higher in the larger society. Now, we have reached the stage where we receive N1.6 million for an event. My wife even thinks I am an armed robber because she works for 30 days to earn what I earn in one day.

And your father was not impressed by this?

My dad felt that the best career for me was law. I wanted to prove to him that comedy is better than law. I am a graduate but I chose to pursue comedy because I had a dream. As soon as my dad realised that I was hell bent on pursuing comedy, he disowned me. In fact, he stopped sponsoring my education. In 1990, I moved to Lagos to pursue comedy as a career. But my uncle threw me out of his house. I moved to the Bar Beach where I lived for a very long while. At the beach, I met Lati Kekere who was nice to me. He is still my friend to this day. He gave me a tent to sleep and I paid N5 per night in those days. After a while, things started to pick up and I went to my uncle’s place to take my things. My washer-man became my wardrobe; I left all my clothes with him. Anytime I needed clothes I go to him. From there, I trekked to NTA every day.

How did popularity come for you?

I started by appearing on NTA. I was on Youth Scene, Youth Rendezvous and the Sunday Show. I was prepared, I wanted opportunity; I got a pager then. There were no mobile phones so I was communicating with my clients on my pager. However, at a point, Bar Beach was no longer safe. Pimps and robbers were taking over so, I moved over to Yabatech. Every day, I trekked to NTA from Yabatech where I squatted with a friend. It was quite a distance but I had a dream that was bigger than the journey. I was committed to my dream. On the side, I made money doing stand-up comedy and by virtue of my pink forms at NTA, by 1998 I had earned over N50,000. Before you know it, I was able to rent a three-bedroom apartment.

What were the things that kept you going?

Where you’re coming from has nothing to do with where you’re going. It is your sheer determination that will take you there. Identify the tools that you need. The only way you can make it is to be prepared so that when opportunity comes, you will be ready. If you’re not where the opportunity is because you don’t have information, you’re wasting your time. My dad taught me this lessons as far back as 1977. According to him, though the country was going through difficult times that was no excuse for youths to be laid back and lazy. Rather, they should look inwards and improve their lots by tapping into the unique talents God has bestowed on them. I did not need government to give me an enabling environment, I created my own. When I started doing stand-up comedy, some people laughed at me. I remember late Mohammed Danjuma told me comedy would never work. He would rather stick to his job as an MC. However, as time rolled by, corporate bodies would invite us for events. Danjuma would be the MC and pocket N50,000 while I would go home with N200,000 as stand-up comedian. Within a short while, he realised that comedy was the way forward and before I could say Jackie Robinson, he was doing comedy as well. I grew up in Ojo Cantonment, Lagos, but I had dreams and goals and what I was going through did not matter. I now live in Ikoyi. You too could achieve this if you believe in your dreams. Believe in yourself. You have to decide on charting a course. Your journey must achieve its purpose.

You also once said that you did not speak with your father for a long time, when did you reconcile with him?

My father and I were not on talking terms for 15 years. My decision to follow my heart was responsible for that. People will tell him, ‘your son, Ali Baba is always on TV. He is making a lot of money. Why don’t you forgive him’, But he would reply, ‘Ali Baba is not my son. I have no child by that name.’ The time for reconciliation came in 2005. I bought him a Mercedes Benz SLK and took it to the village along with my friends. We moved in a convoy of cars. He was surprised when I told him, ‘dad, this is your car,’ and for the first time in 15 years, he finally recognised my success when he shouted, ‘Ali Baba! Ali Baba!!’ That was my happiest moment.

What will you describe as the secret to success?

If you are successful and you’re not touching lives, you’re a failure. If you’re a millionaire and you’re not making millionaires, you’re a failure. AY has made more comedians than I have made. The same goes for Basket mouth too and they all stayed with me once upon a time. To me there are some principles to success. Number one is that your career must provide shelter for you. Two, your career must put food on your table. Three, your career must give you fame, respect, dignity and appreciation. Four, your career must maintain your lifestyle. Five, your career must make you charitable. Six, your career must give you good health. Seven, your career must give you job satisfaction. Eight, your career must match your personality.

You are not the first comedian in Nigeria, yet many describe you as the godfather of comedy. Why do you think you deserve that title?

Comedy was a terrain that nobody had ever travelled. It was a virgin industry. Only few people were in the business when I delved into it full time. People like Jude Oweh Weh, a comedian then who later relocated to America, John Chukwu who was somebody who would have taken stand-up comedy to the next level but passed away. We had people like Patrick Doyle, Tony Saint Iyke, Tunji Sotimirin, Femi Jarret who were practising it bit by bit, but not as their main occupation. There was Muhammed Dajuma who was an actor and also doing stand-up comedy but when I came in, I told him, I wanted to do it full scale. He doubted if I had the potential to do it fully. But he dabbled into movies and he did stage and television production. But, for me, I just wanted to do comedy which was one thing that made me different. I wanted to do just that without depending on any other source of income, so I had to put all my eggs in one basket. I did everything to make sure that I succeeded in it. So I think it is because I excelled in what many shied away from.

Making money in a new profession must have been real hard

There were challenges because people could not understand it as a form of entertainment. People did not want to pay for that kind of thing. They figured it to be free. There was no precedent in the profession. Stand-up comedy is tasking and one needed to do enough to gain acceptability. If at that time when the pay was N2,000 to N5,000, and one was given five minutes on the job and didn’t do it well, one would not be able to get another event. And because, it was the beginning, it was necessary to put in all your best. It wasn’t a piece of cake because there were many challenges. One, there was no house. Secondly, I was just coming to Lagos with a new form of entertainment that people did not believe in.

How do you spend loose hours?

I watch movies, go to cinemas, play football, swim, play with my children. I also engage in photography, hang out with some of my friends like Efere Ozarko. At my spare time because I own my time and must manage it well, I go on social networks to chat with friends on facebook, twitter most of the time. My wife helped to make my home a real haven because she knows what a happy home means to me. My habit of watching many movies is not just for my own entertainment only, but also to be constantly aware of what is happening in the film and TV industry. I also read newspapers to stay abreast of current affairs. All these are essential to make my jokes relevant in our society.

Musicians develop their voices, actors go to acting schools, how do comedians develop themselves on the job?

Comedy is not like any other profession. But I needed to make people know that my service was worth a particular amount and the greatest investment I had was my books, suits and videos. I was spending so much money on trying to improve myself and on the quality of services that I gave. The books were quite cheap because I was getting them from CMS, Mile 2, Ojota, Ojuelegba, Ikeja and Jibowu. So, I combed some of those places and bought books on comedy. And my charges at that time were about N4,000 to N5,000, then it went to N10,000, then to N15,000, that was as far back as 1990 to 1992. But as at 1996, I was charging about N70,000 to N80,000 per event. And what it meant was that we were not many on the job. There was so much money in it because I could do three to four shows in a day. In the mid 90s, it was a lot of money.

Tell us a bit about your growing up years

I started my early life in Warri but when my dad came to Lagos in 1976, I came with him and in between that time, I was in Lagos and I was a barrack boy. So, my early age was in Warri where we were mixing with all kinds of people. But, in the barracks, precisely Ojo Cantonment, I went to St. Michael Primary School, Ojo, Command Secondary School, Ipaja, and went to Warri to join my father when he retired from the Army. He was in the Nigerian Army education unit until he retired and joined the Federal Ministry of Works, Labour and Productivity in Warri. So, childhood was really adventurous. We were denied the luxury of ice cream, cornflakes, chocolate drinks, but anytime we had the opportunity, we enjoyed it very well. While other children were enjoying colour television, we were watching our own black and white television. But we found out that the same programme those people were watching was the same with ours, just that the colour was different. That was nothing to count as suffering but just that we were deprived the luxury that the rich and the famous children were enjoying.

Now that you are rich and famous, your children will definitely not face such a lifestyle

My children are having a good time. They tell me what they want and within a short period, they get it. So, the story is not the same. Kids also keep you young and help curb selfish instincts because their needs come first. The consciousness that they are watching carefully to emulate you is a humbling feeling which makes you think twice before you do anything wrong.

You always flaunt your wife and kids online, you even use their pictures on your profile, you must be really proud of them

My wife and I are not just husband and wife but soul mates. We enjoy a very playful relationship. We also share strong domestic values and are most happy when we are with our children. Like any other couple, we have had our problems but we always overcame them. It is an old truth that for a marriage to be successful, love is not enough; you also need to have someone who is able to support your dreams and be a companion as well as a spouse. She is a banker and an engineer and I love her dearly, the same way she does to me. She manages this home and I take her directives. In fact, she celebrated my 46th birthday anniversary for me.

Some say you are hard to get for a show these days

I have done enough for my industry and this is the time to allow up and coming comedians enjoy in their own world because it is not good to be eating the goodies alone. And the point remains that I still do MC although not in shows that are known but at least, I’m getting my pay. Time has come to let young boys eat from their sweat while we do our own thing. My shows are coded, so, if you want my services, you must be prepared to pay my price. As the forerunner in this particular area of the industry, I have a responsibility to establish ethics. I will say, I contributed a lot to my industry which a lot of people are now benefitting from. There is still space for a lot more people. There are over 1,000 social events going on in Lagos every weekend that we don’t have enough comedians to handle. The quacks will be separated from the real ones. If we have for example 100 events in Lagos on a weekend, 20 are handled by high profile comedians, what happens to the rest 80? So you can see that there will always be people who will still have to patronise these other guys. Not all comedians can be MCs, not all MCs can be comedians, so it’s a mix. There has been instances where certain high profile events have to be shifted because we were already engaged or booked. You will hear people say, ‘haaaa, oga said its either you or no one else’, all I tell them sir, you may have to shift your date to accommodate us and in most cases they do.

 Source: Daily Independent