THE 8th edition of the reality TV show Big Brother Naija (BBNAIJA) ended on Sunday, October 1. 

The show consistently ranks as one of the top favourites, with viewers from across Africa.

This season featured 20 housemates from the last six seasons, terming it the BBN All-Star. Among the returnees were two past winners of seasons 4 and 6, Mercy Eke and Whitemoney.

The current winner, Ilebaye Precious Odiniya, from Kogi state, was previously a housemate of the show’s Level Up (season 7) edition, where she was the third housemate evicted. 

She claimed the coveted N120 million ahead of the first runner-up in the competition, Mercy Eke, a former housemate from the Pepper Dem (Season 4) edition of the show. 

Ilebaye won with 30.08 per cent of the vote cast over Mercy Eke with 23.48 per cent and Cee-C with 23.41 per cent. 

Finale voting results from previous editions 

Olamilekan Agbeleshe, popularly known as Laycon, who was the winner of the show during its lockdown (season 5) edition, set the record for the highest win percentage of 60 per cent ahead of fellow housemate Dorothy at 21.85 per cent and Nengi at 15.03 per cent. 

Mercy Eke, the winner of the Pepper Dem (season 4) edition of the show, won with 41.77 per cent over Mike Edwards’s 19.94 per cent and Frodd (Chukwuemeka Okoye) with 16.46 per cent, who is also part of the BBN All-Star.

Whitemoney (Hazel Oyeze) also participated in the 8th season and was viewed as a possible winner but was later evicted from the show. He won Season 6 (Shine Ya Eye), winning with 46.52 per cent ahead of Liquourose (Roseline Omokhoa) at 22.99 per cent and Pere Egbi at 14.77 per cent. 

With 40.74 per cent of the vote, Phyna (Ijeoma Otabor) won the seventh season of Level Up on BBN. Bella (Chidimma Esther) and Bryann (Brian Chukwuebuka) were close behind with 26.74 per cent and 15.78 per cent, respectively.

According to Nairametrics, the 2019 “Pepper Dem” edition polled 240 million votes, more than twice the figure from the 2018 “Double Wahala” edition. The 2020 “Lockdown” edition garnered over 900 million votes – the highest ever since the show launched in 2006, and ears are still tingling with the announcement that the most recent season polled over 1.3 billion votes.

Multichoice said the BBNaija All-Stars edition recorded 1.53 billion votes cast throughout the season.