FACTUAL STORY THAT TOUCH THE HEART

I was Stuffing the net when a phone rang from a man who introduced himself as forty five year old middle aged man from Osun State. His mission was to invite me to listen to his pathetic story of how he was forced to go back to re-write his G.C.E at aged 38 having failed his W.A.E.C held some twenty years back.And want me to publish it in my blog.

He has chosen to allow the whole world hear his story so that others could learn from it. And I told him to email it at me. 

According to him he had the privilege of having parents that realized the value of education and where prepared to give same to him even though they never were not lettered. They were stack illiterates.

His father was a battery charger operating at Ebute- Metta, Lagos while his mother sells whatever seasonal fruits whenever such is harvested. These could be oranges, walnut, maize .e.tc. His mother was one of those very hardworking and enterprising women that could buy and sell anything that could fetch her money.

She was quite supportive to her husband. His father who whilst he was in school was probably the only battery charger in their Ebute-Metta area of Lagos that sometimes stay over night in his small battery shop to meet the emergency demand of batteries by night crawling car owner should they have problem with their cars at the middle of the night.

 Our man, who gave his full name which however will not be mentioned in this story, revealed that his father came from the middle sized town of Ikire, South West Nigeria. His mother is equally from the place. As a boy born and raised in the Kano street area of Ebute-Metta Lagos, he had the privilege of attending the age long St Jude Primary School, Ebute Metta and enrolled at the C.M.S Grammar School, Bariga, Lagos under the principalship of the Chief I.O Olowu of blessed memory.

He was one of the most popular guys of his days in school and was equally rascally. Even though his parents were not buoyant and struggled to pay his school fees from their meagre resources coupled with the problem of having to cope with finances of five of his siblings, his ways of life did not reflect that of the son of struggling parents.

He had been maintaining fleet of girl friends from his days in Form Three which is now J.S III and was quite popular at recreation areas of that part of Lagos which includes, Evans Square, Ebute- Metta, Rowe Park, Yaba and Railway Recreation Club. Even when some of these areas are sporting points he and some other rascally boys of his days were noted for trouble shooting occurrences in the area. The only thing they never did was stealing.

This went on till the completion of his secondary education at which he failed his final exams woefully. And that marked the beginning of his life problems. While some of his friends who also failed, went back to school or attended extra moral classes to prepare to rewrite their exams, he chose not to do so but instead traveled to Ibadan to live with an Uncle who was a commercial driver plying Ibadan to Ilorin.

He was following this Uncle as a Conductor and within a short period learnt driving. His Uncle was able to obtain a professional driving license for him but then, there was no permanent Bus he could drive but for occasional part time trips he often assists some of his colleagues.

This went on for some time until he was offered an appointment by a man as a private driver. Even when the man was a nice gentleman who was taking care of him like his blood brother, trouble came when he used his car for a commercial purpose during which the car was snatched from him by Armed Robbers. He was therefore dealt with as a member of the gang and dumped at the prison custody indefinitely for years.

After his release settling down became a problem and he was forced to go back to the motor garage where he was absorbed but this time as a tout, within some time he regained his stability but people were very carefully dealing with him with caution on their belief that he may well have being guilty of the offence charged against him but might just be lucky to be discharged and acquainted hence no one wants to trust him nor maintain deep acquaintance with him.

Meanwhile, before he was arrested he had put a girl in the family way and a baby was delivered while he was in detention. But the time he was left off the hook, the lady had married an Alhaji who has claimed to be the father of the boy. Even when he reported the matter to the Law enforcement Agencies, nothing came out. The Alhaji was popular and influential and when once he tried to be confrontational, he was assured of being sent back to detention by the Alhaji. His experience in the prison made him to keep his cool and made up his mind to forget everything about the child.

One thing he was sure of was that the woman knew the boy is his and more importantly resembles him. This period had been fifteen years after he left school and unfortunately his father passed on while he was in detention. His mother had relocated to their village while his siblings were scattered with relations and family friends out of sympathy for his mother.

In short, the family has lost its bearing. The only one that could be considered lucky was one of his sisters that got married to a fairly comfortable man. None of the other siblings went further than primary school. He therefore sat down one day and meditated on his journey in life and concluded that he has wasted the better part of his life by not being serious enough at school to pass his final exams which might probably be a step towards a better life. And that if that had happened, he might render some assistance to his junior siblings which might relief his parents’ burden.

He however summoned courage and decided to get a job as a private driver, but the problem is that his Driving license has expired and to raise money became a problem. He therefore decided to join a car wash garage and was making daily contribution of N500.To be continued next week.