Dear
I came across “tear drop “ and I intend to lend my voice too, and this is my true life story.
It was the year 2013, when I experienced the most shocking experience that changed my life forever
I was 27 years old as then and I was unprepared for what life has to offer.
A life changing and transformative event occurred on my way from work one afternoon. A woman was taking her daughter home from school and she was crushed by a trailer and died instantly, but the little between the ages of maybe 9 – 11, was unhurt.
As the crowd gathered to watch the gruesome misfortune, the little girl still confused was crying, and someone that knows the dead lady said her husband died few years ago.
From the feedback from the crowed it was obvious that the late woman was lost in thought and did not see the truck coming and as such vehicles were built,
it was not made to stop instantly, the gas pedal will have to be applied before it makes a complete stop few some meters away from his intended stop.
The gruesome scene keeps playing in my mine over and over again, and I felt bad that I could not help the situation. Here in Nigeria even though a federal parastatal is in place to track population and which is supposed to have a centralized data base management, it is still ineffective,
I Was unable to locate the little girl, and I felt really bad, my thought were perhaps she was taken to an orphanage home, or maybe she is with her grandparents or uncle.
But as the case may be, no guardian can take good care of a child the way her biological parent would, especially the mother, perhaps the was the starting point of my journey towards charity and empowering orientation.
MY JOURNEY
I Started first by encouraging some youths in my neighborhood who usually lurk around doing nothing by giving them some pep-talk, I assured them that time is running out and they will eventually find a lady they will fall in love with ,but how will they feed the wife and kids? They were informed about the financial burden involved when a man decides to start a family, without a constant source of income the family will be ruined.
“WHAT DOES IT PTOFIT A MAN TO GAIN THE WHOLE WORLD AND LOOSE HIS OWN SOUL”
We started a community project every last Saturday of the month, we would clean the gutters, which is a norm here, but the landlord association noticed the youths listen to me and gave me the task of using them for various community chores.
I felt I wasn’t doing enough, and so I spoke with some friends of mine, and we decided to raise a trust fund for out of school kids in the vicinity, we visited churches, mosque, small and medium scale firms, coupled with 20% of our salaries we were able to sponsor 4 girls to the primary school, then public school cost about 10,naira per term so we paid for a complete 6 years, the bank will release the funds to the school every six months, we ensured the parent do not have access to the funds but the school.
NO GOOD DEEDS GO UNPURNISHED:
Soon words spread round town that we were running a non-governmental organization and parents began to approach us for help. Trust me it was overwhelming. We had our cell meeting every Sunday, we came to a conclusion that we needed sponsors.
We approached some stakeholder in Abeokuta, Ogun state and some obliged. The nest batch was a mixture of both boys and girls (9 in total) that were usually used for child labor by their parents to hawk fruits, vegetables tomatoes etc, we spoke to their parents and surprisingly some parents refused to allow their child/wards attend school, so we brought down the hammer on them, informing them that they were contravening the 1999 Nigerian constitution which goes against child labor.
Yes they succumbed and we monitored the kids to be sure that they resume school as at when due. We employed a lady to keep track of all sponsored wards.
I moved to Lagos 9th January 2017, my contract was not renewed, and I need to get another job, but my comrades continued the struggle as I often get updates from them. I was introduced to steemit and I saw the limitless opportunity, and I started promo-steem.
If You Don’t Train Them, Don’t Blame Them
I first I decided to train youths in urban areas, but I decided to concentrate more on the youths in the rural area were 20 out of 50 youths don’t have access to the internet.
URBAN AREA
1.Training was held at shoprite,Ikeja,Lagos
- TraininG was held at Rafiu Babalola
Lekki,Admiralty way Lagos
RURAL AREAS
Trainin was held at pako Bus stop,ikotun
second batch of training held on the second day
A meeting with youth was held last week Sunday
and we discussed ways on how to indulge the youths in steemit,one-one training with individual was held
I faced a lot of challenges which includes funds and epileptic power supply, time management, venue, inability rent a projector etc.
Most importantly with all these shot-comings a lot has been achieved, as I I intend to empower the youths to be self-reliant.
I have decided to add other entrepreneurial skill to their training.
Kindly visit my Dtube chanell for videos.