Emmy-winning entertainment anchor and reporter Ojinika Obiekwe has filed a lawsuit against New York’s WPIX (PIX11) News over gender and racial discrimination after being fired two years ago.
Obiekwe, 46, is a Nigerian-born journalist who spent over 20 years of her career at the network, gaining accolades, including an Emmy award, for her work. She started as an intern at WPIX in 2001 and held several roles over the last 16 years before her full-time promotion to entertainment anchor in 2017, according to Page Six and her station bio.
However, according to the complaint filed in the Southern District of New York in January, Obiekwe said things appeared to have taken a different turn after her promotion. She described “having to do the work of two or even three employees, such as the work of a Segment Producer and even that of a Copy Editor,” allegedly without the station providing her needed support.
WPIX is one of several news stations in New York that Nexstar owns. Obiekwe alleged in the lawsuit that white male entertainment anchors at sister stations like KTLA in Los Angeles and WGN-TV in Chicago were paid more, were not overworked, and had “more support and a more competent staff” than her, per Page Six.
Obiekwe started to share the issues she had with the station openly in 2020, often referring to herself as an enslaved person over the alleged unfair treatment she received from her employers.
“All that’s left for me to do at this point is pick cotton,” she said, describing her work responsibilities, according to the New York Post.
“This might as well be a plantation,” she often said, the complaint states.
Obiekwe then filed a complaint with Nexstar’s human resources department and met with newly hired news director Nicole Tindiglia, who vowed to improve the workplace, but those promises fell short, the lawsuit alleges.
Obiekwe continued to share her experience at WPIX publicly, with additional remarks comparing herself and her work conditions to those of enslaved people. “Just call me Django,” she said, referring to the fictional character in the 2012 movie Django Unchained, according to the suit, per the Post. “But even Django was unchained,” she said.
“I thought slavery was abolished,” she remarked, according to the suit.
In fall 2022, Tindiglia held a meeting in her office with Obiekwe, sharing that her remarks about the job made other employees uncomfortable, per the suit. Tindiglia then fired Obiekwe in January 2023 for “failing to perform job duties” and “insubordination,” the Post reported.
Obiekwe hired Andrew Celli Jr. and Eric Abrams, lawyers at the law firm ECBAWM in New York, to represent her. When her legal team asked her former employer to provide evidence of her alleged failed job performance, they could not provide that information and later dropped it from the suit.
Once news articles began reporting the news of her lawsuit, Obiekwe made a statement on Instagram. In the caption, she wrote, “A-hem (clears throat) Helllooooo all and Feliz Fridaaaaaay 👋🏽 😊 So…. This is all I have to say (for now) Re: news reports/articles about the lawsuit filed against @PIX11News @Nexstarmediagroupinc Thank YOU, See ya soon, and a Happy Black History Month to us all 🙏🏾 Xoxo OJI.”
Read the statement in full below:
View this post on Instagram
