Tobi Bakre Explains Why He Quit Banking To Compete In Big Brother Naija
Tobi Bakre gained mainstream prominence when he participated in the 2018 Big Brother Naija Double Wahala edition where he finished as the third runner-up.
The Nigerian reality star has since gone on to carve a career for himself in the movie industry.
He has appeared in several Nollywood movies, including most recently, Gangs of Lagos where he featured as the lead character, Obalola.
ALSO READ: Tobi Bakre On Preparing For Gangs Of Lagos Says ‘He Drank Alcohol, Went To Graveyard’
Prior to going into mainstream television, Tobi Bakre worked as a currency dealer in Heritage Bank for four years but resigned because the job became “boring”.
Tobi was featured in the recent episode of Menisms’ audiovisual podcast by Olumurewa and Michael Sonariwo.
He said,
“My personality when I’m doing the same thing over and over it tends to get boring.
At that time I was still young. I think I was 22 at that time.
So, I said ‘okay I have always wanted to go on this show [Big Brother Naija], and I’m tired of this [banking] job.’
So, it was either I start processing my japa [Visa] to Canada or I can go for [BBNaija].
And then it was more like you can go for this thing [BBNaija] and then come back and process your Canada [Visa] and whatever life brings.”
Tobi Bakre Delves Into Reality Show
In the latter part of the interview, Tobi Bakre spoke about registering for the Big Brother Naija edition.
He had this to say,
“I was just really tired of where I was.
So, I was like okay let me take a chance on this [BBNaija].
So, we went for Big Brother and then I didn’t really think after Big Brother this is what I want to do, that is what I want to do.
I was just like okay, in case anything should come up, I got like management, someone I respected and trusted. And I was like ‘please o, whatever it’s I’m doing there [Big Brother house], plz make sure there’s value to be gotten when I get out’.”
The former TV Reality star said he was elated to see his former boss at the bank bring a range rover to pick him from the airport when he came out from the Big Brother House in South Africa.
He admitted that it was his first time of entering a range rover.
He said he was also excited to see his Instagram page skyrocket to 250k followers.
Tobi disclosed that because he didn’t win the grand prize, his fans donated N800,000 to his account.
“Because I didn’t win, a lot of fans, people have sent money to my account.
Sorry guys, I’m just confessing for the first time.
I entered the bank with like nothing.
I remember myself and one of my friends, Adamu, that December because life was tough, we were like ‘let’s just spend all our money and enjoy ourselves’.
And this is what we did.
We were clubbing, we were partying, we spent all the money. So there was really no money in January. I just got out [of Big Brother house] and I saw like N800 and something thousand in my account. So I [used it] got an iPhone. But then, I was ready to do the work. I think the rest is history,” he added.