Charity Nwakaudu

If there are those praying fervently for the end of the COVID-19 pandemic, make-up artists and cosmetic dealers in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, top the list. The battle line has been drawn; it is either their prayers kill the pestilence or the pandemic kills their businesses. 

On a daily basis, they lament low patronage due to the mandatory wearing of facemask to check the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to them, life has become unbearable as many women and fops no longer see the need of wearing makeup, when it would be eventually masked with the facemask. 

Both the makeup artists and cosmetic dealers are at a loss as to when their businesses will boom again, since scientific permutations indicate that the rampaging pandemic may not end anytime soon. No date has been set as the COVID-19 eradication timeline, even as scientists wrestle against time to develop a vaccine. Till then, the use of facemask subsists. 

A make-up artist in Wuse 2, Joy Abraham, lamented the significant drop in patronage since the outbreak of the pandemic on the use of facemask as a preventive measure by the government: “Makeup business was one of the most promising businesses in the FCT before the COVID-19 pandemic.

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“Nine out of every 10 ladies and some young men you see on the road wear one form of makeup or the other. But with what is on ground today, that is the compulsory wearing of facemask, most of our customers have stopped patronising us.

“This business has really gone bad even feeding is now a problem because at times you don’t even get job for a whole day.” 

Emeka Okereke, a makeup artist in Maitama: “This COVID-19 won’t kill someone o! It has not been easy in the makeup business. Most of our classy ladies do not see any reason for fashionable looks again. They believe it cannot be admired by others since it will be covered and even stain their masks. The few that cannot do without it go on light makeups, which they do by themselves.

“Before the pandemic, I have customers whom I do home services for. Some give me time to come and make them up for special occasions. Since this case started, none of them has called. When I tried calling them, they asked me the benefit of it when their faces will be covered after everything. That it is a waste of the available little resources.”

Helen Usman is based in Kubwa, an Abuja satellite town: “Everything has changed since the coming of this pandemic because of the use of this thing called facemask. Yes, there is no money anywhere but the case of make-up business is the worst. Most ladies no longer see the need of wearing makeup because they will still cover it with facemask.”