Chief Ikpea Leemon’s Agony In The Hand Of His Wife

<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Chief Ikpea Leemon’s agony has been traced to the wife as reported in <strong><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;t">OpenLife Nigeria<&sol;a><&sol;strong><&sol;em><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Forget the wealth and status&comma; the gilded and glamorous lives&semi; they don’t necessarily guarantee longevity or contentment in marriage&period; Grace&comma; patience and tolerance for each other do&period; Alas&comma; it seems many Nigerian women are running thin on these three virtues<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Since news broke recently that Justice Joseph Itsebaga Acha of the Edo State High Court granted the application of billionaire oil magnate&comma; Chief  <strong>Ikpea<&sol;strong> Leemon&comma; for his wife&comma; Mrs&period; Agnes Ikpea&comma; to vacate their family home in Banana Island&comma; Lagos&comma; and to refrain from further causing him any harm&comma; opinions and reactions have been mixed as many who do not know the intricacies of the case have been screaming blue murder&period; Others have castigated and queried Justice Acha as if he started the legal profession yesterday&period; For emphasis&comma; Justice Acha is the second most senior Judge in the Edo State High Court hierarchy&period; So&comma; he is no small fry&excl;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>On February 17&comma; 2021&comma; Justice Acha granted Chief Ikpea’sapplication and ordered him to provide suitable accommodation for his wife around Victoria Island&comma; Lekki or anywhere convenient in Lagos outside of Banana Island&comma; Ikoyi&comma; pending the determination of the substantive divorce suit&period; That was two weeks ago&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>It was not until Monday&comma; March 1&comma; that a clearly jaundiced and jejune report surfaced in the social and traditional media that Mrs Ikpea was ejected from the same house the court had asked her to vacate&period; Pictures of the &OpenCurlyQuote;ejection’ – with her bags and other paraphernalia all neatly arranged in luxury travel bags and sellotaped cartons – were generously displayed&comma; in a move that discerning watchers have interpreted as deliberately whipping up public sentiments&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><img class&equals;"alignnone size-medium wp-image-7443" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2021&sol;03&sol;wide-1-219x300&period;jpg" alt&equals;"Chief Ikpea " width&equals;"219" height&equals;"300" &sol;><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Contrary to the report that Chief Ikpea didn’t get her accommodation as stated by the court&comma; it was learnt that instead of asking her to go to one of the numerous houses he had acquired for her over the years&comma; Chief Ikpea got his estranged wife a well-appointed apartment in a gated estate in Ikoyi&comma; Lagos&period; Even her own can attest to this fact&comma; as he okayed and signed to that effect&period; it&period; It remains unclear why she is crying blue murder&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>And Sources close to the family also posit that Mrs Ikpea was not in short supply of where to move to based on the court order&period; Before they parted ways&comma; the Ikpeas had six children all of who are now adults and living very well off their father’s affluence&period; Their 30-year-old son lives in a N450million house in Banana Island bought by Chief Ikpea last November and she could have conveniently moved there&period; One of her daughters&comma; Augusta Ikpea-Enaholo&comma; also runs the Royal Oaks Event Centre&comma; a multipurpose state-of-the-art event centre in Lekki&comma; commissioned in 2019 by Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu&period; The event centre&comma; valued at about N850m&comma; was solely funded by Chief Ikpea&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Other children of the Ikpeas all have their multi-million naira businesses and homes courtesy of their father&period; But it is alleged that the man was never happy in the marriage because every attempt he made to brush his wife up educationally and socially failed&period; Chief Ikpea reportedly married Agnes as an illiterate from a village in their native Edo State&period; He gave her everything she wanted in life&period; He had beautiful plans&period; The plans were lofty and lovely&period; But things did not quite go as planned as the character traits of the two partners conflicted with their starry-eyed dreams&period; Even during their stormy marriage&comma; the man hardly had a breathing space until he could no longer bear her undisguised antagonism to him&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Some of the factors that may also have led to Chief Ikpea deciding to quit the marriage for good include the ingratitude of his children who – despite all he does – are not on speaking terms with him&semi; and his belief that their mother deliberately turned them against him&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;After working so hard all his life&semi; and after all he has done for his family – nuclear&comma; extended and even his daughters’ husbands included – Chief Ikpea deserves his peace of mind&period; The society or his kids should not decide for him where his happiness is&comma;” said a family member of the Ikpeas&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>A businessman and philanthropist&comma; Chief Ikpea is an intensely private and media-shy billionaire&period; Apart from contemporaries in the business circle and a few friends in the political space&comma; he never hugs the limelight like other billionaires&period; Given that there is no legal or constitutional restriction whatsoever as to which court one can seek divorce in Nigeria&comma; Chief Ikpea chose Benin&comma; Edo State&comma; not because he is from the state or is acquainted with Justice Acha&period; In fact&comma; sources close to him say he has never met the Justice&excl; However&comma; the obvious media trial against Chief Ikpea not only beggars belief but skirts moral boundaries&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;