by Prince Joshua

I listened to the story I would find nowhere except from my beautiful mother. She told me her water broke, ushering her into the ecstasy of motherhood on that Friday night. She must have been engulfed in the joy described by Buchi Emecheta in her book,  “THE JOYS OF MOTHERHOOD”.

If I had a choice from genesis to select the family I found myself, I would have gone for a better family, where life would be enjoyable.  Mother shared her love life fantasies of how she met this dark-skinned, tall and kind Yoruba man in Lagos and drove on the sweet path of love with him. Most women dream of tall, dark, muscularly built, kind and rich men to settle down with. It’s true my father had all these qualities but the last adjective  “RICH”  was missing. I wished fear would allow me to ask mother what enchanted her to a man who wasn’t rich.

Father was a taxi-driver who had three wives and eleven children with me being one of the only two sons he had and the first child of my mother was the last wife! Born and bred in the Ajegunle part of Lagos, I attended Gaskiya College, Badia in 2001 and eventually was relocated by our father in 2002 to Agege when I was thirteen. Father had given his word that he had no money for a private school and so we went to the local education district at Agege Oko-Oba road to get the necessary forms and process the entry into a public school in the area but we kept hitting one bureaucratic stone wall or the other. Consequently, I was at home for ten months.

I experienced for the first time firsthand how our civil servants take their jobs so much levity without understanding that they owe God an account of how their actions and inactions affect so many lives and destinies. Because in 2003, precisely on the 31st of December, a General Hospital medical doctor refused to attend to my father who was having internal hemorrhage owing to an attack a week before and in 24 hours, my father was a corpse – His reason was that he had to go home to enjoy the watchnight!.

I watched life ebb out of him while I was only fifteen and I felt that was the end of life. By dint of hard work and optimism, I went on to gain admission into the University of Lagos in 2007 and when things began to fall apart owing to starvation, financial difficulties and winding   academic   results,   I   THOUGHT   SUICIDE   WAS   THE   WAY  OUT!   Only   a session with a good Samaritan nurse gave me a rethink. I recalled all I had gone through right from my days in high school.

As if I had not suffered enough, this went on and on for ten months – I was at home with no school to go. No school, no admission in sight and I was wasting and pining away, my self-confidence was reducing, I doubted if I was meant for the four walls of a school anymore. Painfully,  my   five   older   siblings have since dropped  out and so   it   was   already  the antecedence that I may not exceed junior secondary three. However, I was strongly determined to go to school and that, as far as possible.

Fast forward the script to March   2015,   I   was   at   the   finals   of   the   Global   Student Entrepreneurs Award in Lagos, Nigeria, having taken initiative to start a business with only less than a dollar in 2013 in my third year in Unilag. Standing in front of about sixteen internationally successful businessmen and women from around the World who had flown in to judge my business ideas at the Porsche Event Centre in Victoria Island that beautiful Monday morning, I started my line with:“My   name   is   Prince   Joshua   but   I   am   called   Ambassador   PeeJay. I  am a  media entrepreneur whose work on radio was inspired by my personal story.” They listened intently and seemed to be drawn in by my narration. In no time, eight minutes was up and it was now time for the judges to ask questions.

The first question was on if I had a team who worked with me and I was glad to point out two of them who were in the audience, Kunle Oladoyin, my technical producer and Eniola Lawal, one of my co-hosts, at the time. They looked satisfied with my response until the next question came in.“How do you see your business beyond the four walls of the campus”? I was prepared for this as I told them my blueprint  and business model which was not originally built around the university environment but could survive outside of it. Then, I heard that line I was looking forward to  hearing,  “No  further question. You  may  go”.

I stepped out straight with my phone to speak with another of my spiritual mentors and I was prayed for and told to believe and I did. Fast forward to three hours later, the dinner which was where the winner would be announced had started and we were all restless. We just couldn’t wait to know who was going to win the one million naira prize money, a crystal award plaque, a business school Netherlands scholarship, a Microsoft high end laptop and an all expense-paid trip to represent the Country in the United States of America. It was too good to be true but for one winner.

Deep down in me, I had my winners already and Sanni Sherriff of SanniKayz Kitchen topped that list right from the moment I saw him make that late entry to the semi-finals venue and still clinched a space in the top seven. We are all now lined up in front of the audience as the Shola Amusan, the winner of the first edition of the GSEA contest in two thousand and ten took the microphone to announce the winners. “Put your hands together for the second runner-up, Sanni Sheriffof Sannikays Kitchen”.

What!? Sanni came third? Then I’m off it, who else could have beaten this dude to it. He came to this finals prepared. He had his father and mother in attendance amongst the audience. His staff were there and in their company brand shirts and maybe to create a practical impression, he had brought the judges some recipes to try out while he was presenting.

While I was musing, “Okey Godspower of PowerPrint Media”.  I was blank. I didn’t know what to expect and immediately the following words I heard,“and now is the time when we stand up for the champion. I present to you the Winner of the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards Nigeria 2015 and the representative of Nigeria at   the   Global   Student   Entrepreneur   Awards   in   Washington DC…………Prince   Joshua”.

No! This has got to be real. If it is a dream, I choose not to wake up from this sleep. I was face flat in worship. This is a new dawn! The audience was up in standing ovation and I   couldn’t   contain   my   joy.  I   almost   shed   tears.   I   never   thought   I   could   be   a millionaire! I never thought I would be travelling to the United States of America and I never thought it would be on a global stage.

The pressmen had mobbed me and startedwith their loads of questions and for a moment, I felt how those big men feel when they are addressing the press after coming out from a high powered session. The white lady, Miranda Barrett, the Global Membership Director for the Entrepreneurs’ Organizationwas already on hand asking for my passport number so she could send it straight in tothe Washington DC office for my official invitation letter to be emailed to me for my visa processing. Thank God I had it.

I came prepared after all. My colleagues were amazed I had brought my international passport along, as if I knew I would win this. I was calledup, handed over my award plaque and my dummy cheque of five thousand dollars, the equivalent of a million naira, a brand new laptop and of course the trip to the United States and the Business School Netherlands Scholarship.

Today, I have just launched my first book with the title, “FROM NIGHT TO LIGHT –How I Went From Local To Global And How You Too Can”. This has attracted both local and international interests. Many young people are already taking their future in their hands, having been hugely inspired by my story. I have received many local and internationalawards and grants and affected more than 5, 000 young lives in Nigeria and beyond. I am privileged to share this story and hopes it makes someone out there to “never let his background put his back on the ground”.

Thanks!

 

---

This entry was submitted as part of the Nigerian Voices competition organized by YNaija.com.

We publish, un-edited, Nigerians telling the stories of their everyday lives. Read all the narratives daily on the Nigerian Voices vertical. You can also contribute your own story titled ‘Nigerian Voices’ to [email protected].