Nollywood actress Adunni Ade has won a privacy and data protection suit against Vanguard Media Limited and journalist Ayo Onikoyi, with a Lagos State High Court awarding her ₦3 million in damages over a May 2025 story headlined “Beauty not enough to keep a man.”
Justice Olalekan A. Oresanya delivered the judgment on May 7, 2026, ruling that the publication—which featured the actress’s name and photograph alongside commentary on her private marital life—violated her constitutional right to privacy and breached the Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023.
Ade, represented by Olumide Babalola, had originally sought ₦100 million in general damages. She told the court she had always kept her marital life private and never granted any interview to the respondents on her marital status. The publication, she argued, caused her emotional and psychological distress by painting her in a false light.
The second respondent, Ayo Onikoyi, filed a counter affidavit admitting to publishing the story in the Sunday Vanguard edition of May 25, 2025. He argued the piece was culled from the Instagram page of one Kudirat Dolapo on May 13, 2025, and was published in good faith as an instructive piece on marriage and relationships. He denied any intention of malice.
Justice Oresanya resolved all three questions before the court in favour of the actress, finding that the respondents’ exposure of her private marital life constituted an invasion of privacy, that the processing of her personal data was unfair and inaccurate, and that the refusal to publish a retraction violated her data subject right to rectification.
The court awarded ₦3 million against the respondents jointly and severally, a fraction of the ₦100 million sought, but a clear legal victory for the actress, who described the judgment as a vindication of her right to keep her personal life off the pages of newspapers that never asked for her comment.
