Blessing CEO vows no apology over cancer controversy, admits raising N13m

Self-proclaimed relationship and mental health expert Blessing Okoro, popularly known as Blessing CEO, has insisted she owes no one an apology over her controversial breast cancer disclosure.

Okoro made the remarks in an interview with social media influencer Egungun of Lagos, posted on Saturday, where she also denied claims of a stage four diagnosis and admitted raising only N13m, not the N100m widely reported, in public donations.

“For what? Who did I hurt?” she said when asked to apologise to people who felt misled by her stage four claim.

“I think I’m not a doctor and maybe I just passed the message that a doctor gave to me.”

She also attributed the stage four claim to a possible miscommunication. “Maybe it’s miscommunication because that was what I was told, but I’m also trying to, when you do your biopsy, I want to have different options and be sure of what I’m doing,” she said.

Okoro said she was yet to receive a definitive cancer stage assessment from her oncologist.

“I don’t know the stage I am right now because I’ve run all the tests. In a few days’ time I’ll go back to my oncologist and they will be able to tell me the exact stage,” she said.

She said she had not begun chemotherapy, describing the biopsy as the most recent procedure.

She traced the health scare to a lump he claims to have discovered last year which doctors initially certified as non-cancerous, only for a subsequent test to reverse that finding.

“It was a lump. Initially they said it was not cancerous. After a few months when I wanted to take out the lump they now said it is cancerous,” she said.

On publishing her medical results, she was equally unyielding. “I can’t post my results online. It’s personal stuff,” she said.

Dismissing the viral claim that she had received N100m in donations, she said the figure was N13m. “I never reached N100 million,” she said.

On the possibility of a mastectomy, she said, “We are hoping it doesn’t get to that point, but if it gets to that point, the most important thing is let me be alive.”

She also used the platform to call for breast cancer awareness, urging women to conduct daily self-examinations.

“As a lady, the most common kind of cancer we have is breast cancer. So please every morning when you wake up always try to check your breast and check if there is a lump,” she said.

The defiant stance comes as the controversy surrounding her diagnosis deepens.

Her announcement initially drew widespread sympathy from fans and fellow public figures, but scepticism quickly mounted over the absence of verifiable medical evidence.

Allegations of medical report forgery also surfaced, with a woman, Deborah Mbara, accusing her of editing her medical documents to deceive the public.

On Thursday, businessman Alafaa Kariboye-Igbo, known as Oil Money, who claimed to have donated N20m, shared a legal demand letter on Instagram instructing Okoro to refund the sum within seven days or face legal action, including a report to law enforcement.

Okoro has previously been embroiled in controversy, including a 2019 incident in which she falsely claimed ownership of a luxury property, leading to her arrest and subsequent public apology.