Left Behind But Not Forgotten

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One regular morning in 2024, Mrs Oluwatosin Adeniyi was standing in front of her make-shift school at Kpaduma Hills, Asokoro, Abuja, when a group of eight boys — all in their preteens — passed by, chatting away in Hausa. It was around 10am. The sight of so many young boys roaming the streets so early in the day gave her some concern and she found herself issuing them a query on the spot.

“Why are you guys not in school?” she asked, motherly.

It turned out that they could not speak English. Only one of them could communicate with her — but in a lower version of Pidgin English. The rest simply looked on.

“No money for school,” the boy replied.

“So where are you guys going this morning?” she fired the second query.

The “head boy” said they were moving from one construction site to another to scavenge for disused cement bags. They would gather about 50 of the bags and sell them in order to raise money to buy their breakfast. How much would they sell those little bags for? The boy said N280. How would eight of you feed on N280? He said it was not a problem: they knew how to do it. In the background, a 10-year-old boy named Mohammed had been sobbing as soon as Adeniyi started the interrogation. She couldn’t understand why the boy was upset, but she asked the “head boy” to implore Mohammed to “calm down”. She assured them that she meant no harm and was only interested in their welfare.

Mrs Adeniyi developed a liking for Mohammed. She told the “head boy” to ask Mohammed to come with his mother to the school the following day. Alas, she was not to see Mohammed and his mother until two months later. Apparently, the boys don’t even sleep at home. They sleep in the streets and only go home once in a blue moon. Their parents cannot be bothered. They have countless children. Where is the money to clothe and feed the multitude, much less buy them books and uniforms to enrol in school? They are abjectly consumed by the tussle for Maslowian food, shelter and clothing.

Mrs Adeniyi was glad Mohammed came back with his mother. She quickly declared her intention via an interpreter: “I want your son to come and enrol with us. Don’t worry, you are not going to pay any fees. We will give him a uniform and we will feed him once a day.” His mother was over the moon and prayed fervently for Mrs Adeniyi. It was very clear that she wanted her son to go to school, but where would the money come from? She had basically lost Mohammed to the streets and was not expecting anything good from him. The best Mohammed could hope to become in the future was a truck pusher or bus driver — which is not completely awful, compared to becoming a criminal.

The long and short of my story: Mohammed was finally enrolled at Mrs Adeniyi’s Not Forgotten Initiative (NFI) School in 2024 at the age of 10 and — you won’t believe this — he has been the best at mathematics in the entire school. “Incredibly, Mohammed has won every single mathematics championship since he joined two years ago,” Mrs Adeniyi told me, with excitement in her voice. “His English is still neither here nor there, but his mathematics is fantastic.” I despaired. How many potentially great mathematicians are out there — all over the north, all over Nigeria — who cannot explore their God-given gift because of deprivation and have, thus, become a burden on the society?

Mrs Adeniyi, a chartered accountant, did not set out to set up the school. She is, by all means, successful and comfortable in her chosen walk of life. But when her family was living at the Kpaduma Hills in the exclusive Asokoro area of Abuja, she noticed that the children of the artisans, most of them Hausa, Fulani and Gwari, were not going to school. For someone who was born into a culture where you must start kindergarten (“jeleosimi”) as early as two years of age, she was worried about how children in their preteens were still unable to read or write — or even communicate in any other language apart from Hausa, the lingua franca of hundreds of ethnic groups in northern Nigeria.

She decided to bring some children together and started teaching them “A for Apple”. Parents also brought their wards from the low-income slums of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) for free lessons — and free lunch. These children had been left behind by the system. There is the problem of population explosion, which is fuelling poverty and disease. But there is also the problem of the government (and the society) not acting like there is a problem. This is evident in the neglect of the social sector — education, in particular — when it comes to budgetary allocations, releases and execution. It is government’s primary responsibility, but, in the end, it is everybody’s problem.

In 2018, Mrs Adeniyi finally turned the informal gathering into a mission: to provide free, quality education to children from underserved and low-income communities. She built a temporary structure and registered the school with the FCT. From supporting just 14 children at inception, NFI School now caters for 165 annually. The children get one free meal per day — which is a big relief for their parents, otherwise those kids would have had to choose between schooling and helping their parents sell garri and groundnuts, assuming council officials would not one day come and confiscate their wares and pack them into detention centres. This is the lot of the disadvantaged in Nigeria.

Mrs Adeniyi initially funded the school, with the full support of her husband, Mr Olusegun Adeniyi, one of the leading lights of Nigerian journalism. But the school has been receiving support over the years from public-spirited individuals as well as local and international organisations. For instance, Metro Bakery and Restaurant, an Abuja-based top-class eatery owned by Mrs Sandra Adio, supports the school with lunch once a week. The children always look forward to the special delicacy. Some individuals have “adopted” children to support. The school now sponsors some of the kids to low-cost primary schools as well as provides scholarships for indigent students in secondary schools. Some of them have also been lucky enough to gain admission to federal government colleges.

My visit to the school humbled me in many ways. For one, I felt overprivileged. I did not choose my parents or my ethnicity, and I could have been among the kids roaming the streets looking for disused bags of cement. I lost my father when I was four and my mother was a housewife who only did little tailoring. As a kid, I had dreams, dreams bigger than the size of my head. Yet, I could have been in my village today drinking palm wine and maybe fathering children irresponsibly if I did not enjoy the privilege of having a family that gave me an education and a chance in life. For every Mohammed at NFI School, there are perhaps 10 other Mohammeds still roaming the streets.

I went round the four classrooms and asked the children questions. What do you want to be in the future? Most of them said “doctor”. Why? “I want to save lives!” Two of them said “pilot”. Some said “lawyer”. Another said “engineer”. Hopes and dreams are written on their faces. If NFI School had not picked them off the streets, they might never have had a chance to even dream. Now that they know their ABC and 123, they think they can become doctors, lawyers, engineers and teachers. That is what happens when the heart is open to education and education opens up the heart. They have a hope and a future, and they are dreaming big. At least, they can dream. That is the starting point.

Two children said something different. Aisha, a little Fulani girl, said she wanted to be a teacher. I was surprised. We don’t really celebrate teachers in Nigeria, so what’s the attraction? Mrs Adeniyi whispered to me that she comes from a family of 11 and she is the only one attending school, so she goes back home to teach her siblings, both older and younger, what she learns in school. No wonder she wants to be a teacher. I was touched. Another child said he would like to be a singer. I asked him and other children their favourite artistes and I started hearing Asake, Burna Boy, Ruger, Shallipopi, Davido, and so on. I told myself: this is the real Nigeria where we do not discriminate on the basis of ethnicity and religion until politicians and bigots come to manipulate and pollute our innocence.

As I was about to leave, I looked at Mrs Adeniyi in the eye and asked: “Do you think any Nigerian politician will make heaven?” She laughed. It was a joke, but I was serious. The Abuja where politicians are sharing billions of naira every day and cruising in one-in-town cars is the same Abuja where out-of-school children are selling disused cement bags to feed. It is the same Abuja where parents are withholding their children from school because they cannot afford to get them a pair of uniforms. I know there is inequality in every society all over the world, but our own is five-star and insane. Nigeria has become a huge factory for the production of idle hands for the devil’s workshop.

I left NFI School happy. I saw the impact one public-spirited individual can make on a disadvantaged community. Although she is getting support, she can use some more. In fact, we need many Mrs Adeniyis across Nigeria, particularly in the north. An FCT official from the north was so impressed with her work that he prayed fervently for her. “When I was informed that an individual set up this school, I said only a southerner can do this. Our people will never do this,” the official told her on the phone. I throw down this challenge to northerners of means: please help get the children off the streets and give them an education! The system left them behind, but they must never be forgotten.

AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…

REAL TROUBLE

The senate on Thursday adopted amendments to the 2022 Electoral Act but rejected the proposal for real-time transmission of results. That is, results will still be transmitted electronically but not necessarily in real time. This has created a fresh storm. I am 100 percent for real-time transmission. We need to pile pressure on the lawmakers to allow it, even if for its novelty. However, here we go again! Real-time transmission is now being packaged and touted as the super solution to rigging. We just love magic bullets in Nigeria! “If we do this, our problems will be solved forever.” Real-time transmission is very attractive to help with improving the process, but it is not fool-proof. Caution.

STATE OF EMERGENCY

In Nigeria, we throw words and concepts around anyhow. Every little thing, people will say “declare state of emergency”. Declare state of emergency on this. Declare state of emergency on that. Tinubu declared state of emergency on insecurity but Nigerians are still being massacred. The federal government announced that bandits, kidnappers and whoever will all be classified as terrorists going forward. Fine. But how has that changed anything? Even the details of the state of emergency are not yet public, so we are left guessing. Maybe we should now focus less on semantics and spend more time on kinetics. Nigerians need to be assured that their country can protect them. Critical.

CHANGE OF TUNE

When I read that US President Donald Trump was sending troops to help Nigeria in the fight against terrorism and insurgency, I was confused. Those who campaigned for Nigeria to be labelled a country of particular concern must be confused too. We were told that Trump was coming to remove President Tinubu. To make matters worse, Trump specially recognised Mrs Remi Tinubu at the US national prayer breakfast in Washington, DC, on Thursday, saying: “We are honoured to be joined today by the First Lady of Nigeria, who also happens to serve as a Christian pastor at the largest church in Nigeria, very respected woman… it’s a great honour.” What’s going on here? Backfired.

NO COMMENT

Prof Nentawe Yilwatda, the national chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), was wise enough not to get involved in the face-off between Chief Nyesom Wike, the FCT minister, and Sir Siminalayi Fubara, the governor of Rivers state. Wike is theoretically in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) while Fubara recently defected to the APC. “When it comes to the issue between Wike and Fubara, it’s not within my purview as the national chairman of APC. Wike is in PDP, Fubara is in APC,” Yilwatda said. Of course, he could easily have come to the defence of Fubara, his party member, but he knows the real meaning of “touch not my anointed”. We all know what we are doing. Hahahaha.