The name Obi Cubana has been on the lips of every Nigerian ever since he put his village Oba, Anambra State on the world map. It’s no secret that he made this happen on the occasion of his mother’s burial that took place from July 8th through July 11, 2021.
Putting the entire country on a standstill, Obi Cubana broke several records including receiving over 500 livestock from friends, family and business associates. Also shocking everyone, the carnival-like burial saw naira notes and dollars rain like paper in a never seen before fashion.
Sequel to this show-stopping event, many Nigerians who had never heard about Obi Cubana before began asking questions, the most prominent of them being how he made his money. Of course they didn’t need to look too far to find the answers.
Also known as God’s preferred son or Okpataozuora, Obi Cubana’s profile as a real estate hospitality and nightlife mogul is not in doubt. Many found out he’s the CEO of Cubana Group, a chain of night clubs and hotels spread across Enugu, Owerri, Abuja and Lagos. His estimated worth is over 90 million dollars, including his multi million dollar homes (in Anambra, Abuja, Lagos) and the exotic cars in his garage.
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Surprisingly, many are still not satisfied by his impressive and legitimate business profile. According to them, only someone into money rituals and illegitimate businesses such as drugs and high class scamming would spray money the way he and his friends did during his mother’s burial.
Should we blame Nollywood for this? Well, if you’re in this category of people who doubt the source of Obi Cubana’s wealth, this article will tell you the real story of how he became a billionaire in naira.
According to BBC Pidgin, Obi Cubana whose real name is Obi Iyiegbu, became a millionaire in dollars primarily from hard work and secondarily from consistency, integrity, discipline, diligence and of course open mindedness.
He said a pastor could not make anyone rich because they are the ones who need money the most and a native doctor cannot give anyone money from rituals because his children are the ones who fetch water from the stream. So, anyone who needs money should simply work hard.
Explaining further to BBC Pidgin, Obi said his journey to becoming the successful billionaire businessman he is today started after completing his NYSC at the National Assembly Abuja. He looked for a job for a long time in the center of unity that even his shoe began begging for mercy.
He eventually stopped looking for a white collar job and started hustling. Obi set up a small cafeteria commonly called “mama put” and later set up a beer parlor.
After the building was demolished, he changed his strategy and opened Ibiza club. During this period, he lived in a 12×12 one room apartment in Abuja with five other people hustling for daily bread. Obi Cubana said he made his first million immediately after NYSC when he met a client who asked him to furnish his house.
At that time, he was into a land and house agency in Abuja. He said he made N600,000 as his profit from the deal and the client again gifted him N500,000 for a job well done. Altogether, that’s a whooping N1.1 million! He would later join PPMC and began doing contract work with the government. Some of the profit he made was used in buying his first car, a v-boot.
Two years after the struggle, his first nightclub Ibiza took off. Obi Cubana decided to invest more into the nightlife and hospitality industry as it was working for him.
This is what birthed Cubana Group which today is one of Nigeria’s top luxury, hospitality and entertainment brands. Like many other businesses people, business was not always rosy for Obi Cubana. He said at some point he was so frustrated that he planned to leave the country to hustle and start a new life.
He picked up his passport and applied for visa to South Africa where most Nigerian hospitality and nightlife businesses are booming. However, his application was denied, forcing him to stay back in the country to continue hustling.
Apart from his hotels, night clubs and other real estate businesses, Obi makes money from being a brand ambassador to many brands. He also hosts celebrity club parties and concerts. No wonder he is family with all the top Nigerian artists including Davido, Wizkid and Burna Boy.
He also has several partnerships with spirit and wine brands worth millions of naira. Apart from people in his line of business and celebrities, Obi Cubana was previously unknown among the masses. It implies that he is a quiet and private person who doesn’t like to engage in social media banter or stir up controversies. But all thanks to his mother’s burial ceremony, Obi has now grown famous.
Meanwhile Obi’s unpopularity all these years is not to say he has not been generous towards people. Obi is not just a billionaire but also a philanthropist.
In 2013, he reportedly pushed 53 uneducated uber boys to the market to learn how to trade. In 2017, he withdrew them from their masters and settled them with 3 million naira each and also paid for their shops. He again linked 40 of them into the importation business using his goodwill and today Obi says at least 38 of them are billionaires and the rest are millionaires.
Again in 2018, Obi Cubana picked 100 educated men and introduced them to the white men for business and he confirmed that they are now multi millionaires in dollars.
Coming after his mother’s burial, Obi has again promised to give over 300 young men one million naira each to start up a business for themselves and we guess it won’t end there.
Although Obi said he doesn’t give so that they can repay him back, he confirmed that he had benefited immensely from giving and lifting others from poverty. He said some of the people he helped have in return helped him in his own business after they became big men.
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This explains the massive love he was shown during his mother’s burial which wasn’t planned. According to him, money cannot buy the crowd that showed up for the event. He added that he has personal relationships with the men spraying money lavishly at the burial and even has a long history with some of them.
Debunking the erroneous notion that they are all ritualists, Obi noted that all of them own legitimate businesses and they have the right to spend their money as they choose. The father of four also added that he is happy they came through for him and spent money heavily on him because he did not steal or bring disrepute to his community as well as guests.
On why he went all big for his mother’s burial, the silent billionaire explained that he and his siblings promised his mother that they will do a carnival-like birthday party for her 80th birthday. Sadly, she passed away at the age of 78 and because of this, they decided to draw a carnival-like funeral as they promised.
With all his wealth, rich friends and connections with people holding political positions, Obi would describe himself as a simple, natural and real person. He says that he is content with running his business empire and has no interest whatsoever in politics.
