This is why Nigerian celebrities lie to us...

Celebrities lie all the time. It’s no big deal. They lie about anything and everything, just to maintain a look and give off the impression of being larger than life. There can be no flaw in their setup, no defect in their amour. If they can fix it, sure they can fix it with a lie.

The journalists carry these lies, knowing they are lies, and also primarily because fiction made fact is juicier and sensational. Journalists are the bearers of civilisation, the soul upon which good-reason and critical literacy depend, and in many ways that soul has been corrupted by the need for money, and ultimately, human greed. We journalists have lost our souls.

A common celebrity lie is that of possession. That house in Lekki that belongs to some benefactor is claimed with just one photo and a news leak. The sleek car that belongs to a close buddy gets a new public owner with just one selfie and a paragraph of crafted fiction, released to that purpose.

Celebriies are untruthful about affection and allegiances. They are whores of fame, and public romantic interests. It looks cool for the public to talk about their love life, even when false and non-existent. Countless heartfelt feelings, which are news today, exist only in the imagination of the stars and the skill of a journalist. Maybe a selfie can be of good use to drive the point home. Romance is good gossip feed, why be stingy with it? Give the public something to talk about.

Deals are not left out of the picture too. Many monetary figures and exorbitant announced contracts are a scam. In reality, the money is less than it is in the news, but the extravagance given to the public is a matter of necessity.

The last of them all is in the record sales. This is rare and hard to pull off. Alaba International Market is chaos commercialised, and no tracking system has been created for sales. Nigeria just isn’t sophisticated enough for a lie to be told about how many copies of an album gets shipped around. But thanks to Flavour, we have had a first case of this, and it reveals a lot about his sophistication.

Celebrities lie because they can. They are humans who society and fortune has bestowed a public life, and blessed with the scrutiny of the journalists. The newsmen who sniff around them or get in bed with them are the carriers of these petty deceits. They too perform a role in the society that ideally should come with a hunger and vengeful thirst for truth. But alas, they have been corrupted.

Celebrity lies will always go on. The society has placed upon them expectations that are inhuman, and they have a duty to meet and surpass these expectations.

Lying just makes the job easier.