Rilwan Rasheed, 15, and his 10-year-old brother Waris, hadn’t known the meaning of poverty.
In fact, these children were born into relative comfort. They attended a private primary school – a luxury for many children in the area – and lived with their parents. They had no worries even though their father, a thrift collector, had six wives and was even about taking another one.
“We had all sorts of toys. We were oblivious of the life outside the walls of our house. We were the envy of most of our peers and we were seen as privileged kids. Our daily routine was a simple one – school, home, play. It was truly a blissful life,” the elder Rasheed, Rilwan told Punch.
But tragedy struck and the young Rasheeds’ sheltered lives crumbled before they could know what hit them. Rilwan said their father, who was the pillar of the home, fell victim to fraudsters and at the snap of the finger, he lost everything he owned thus it was goodbye to the luxurious life he and his family enjoyed.
And since their father couldn’t withstand the hardship, he quickly abandoned his six wives and his children and relocated to Ibadan, Oyo State, but not without telling the boys’ mother to take care of the children in his absence.
But it wasn’t easy for their mother, Habibat, who was just a petty trader. Rilwan said life got tougher and tougher for him and his kid brother.
“At first, our father visited once in a while, but at some point, he stopped coming. Things got so tough for my mother that the landlord evicted us. We had to move our belongings to my stepbrother’s house. He was quite accommodating but after a few months, his mother began to cause trouble for us, especially for my mother. She was fond of cursing us with the Bible.”
But they endured the abuses and would have continued to endure, at least they were offered shelter. But tragedy struck again!
“One day, there was a fire outbreak in the area and it affected my stepbrother’s house. We had to relocate to Oworonshoki (Lagos). Where we took refuge also got burnt one day and this time, our mother’s savings got burnt as well. That put an end to her petty trading. Some friends were able to give her some money so she had to start selling local herbal concoction (paraga), while I and Waris became scavengers at a dumpsite. Our mother begged her friend to accommodate us at nights while she slept in an abandoned bus at a dumpsite where we picked scraps.”
But the shelter was just a temporary relief as their mother’s friend became intolerant so they had to join their mother to sleep inside the abandoned bus at the dumpsite every night.
The 10-year-old Waris could still remember those days at the dumpsite.
“When we moved to live in a bus with my mother, we really suffered. I remember that after we finished picking broken bottles each day, I would play in the dirt since I had nowhere else to go. People would tell me to go away from their side when I move near them because I was very dirty. Few months after we got there, I was very sick and almost died before God sent us a helper.”
Watching and listening to her kids talk about those terrible days brought tears to the eyes of their mother, who had all along, sat quietly as the young boys talked about their experience.
At that point, Habibat couldn’t but help chip in her own experience in those harrowing days.
“I was advised to use one of my children for rituals when things became so bad. It was a terrible period. I was a very successful business woman. Who would believe that there was a time I bought cars, tricycles and motorcycles for people as gifts? But I eventually became somebody who had to beg for food before I could eat.
“It was at that period that some of my friends told me that I should use one of my children for rituals. I told them that I could not do that because all that I do in life is for my children. I told them that if I did such a thing, I would not be happy anytime I spent the money. I knew that help would eventually come one day.”
And true to her strong belief, help eventually came but from the least place they had expected, a dance group.
Yes, this dance group used to rehearse behind their house back then. After school, the boys said they would watch the group perform. They didn’t forget the group even when they relocated to the dumpsite.
“Uncle Seun usually rehearsed with his group at the back of our house and whenever I heard their drums I went to watch them practice. After their rehearsals, my friends and I would mimic their dance steps using buckets as our drums. We would just be having fun. That was how we met Uncle Seun,” Rilwan said.
And it was ‘Uncle Seun’, who turned their lives around and brought smiles to their faces again.
“Uncle Seun taught us how to dance, with our mother’s consent. That was how our lives changed. Uncle Seun asked us to come and stay with him. He first invited me before he called my younger brother to come too but by then, my brother had fallen very ill and was hospitalised. He paid my brother’s hospital bills and asked our mother to permit us to stay with him. We went back to school.”
Their lives have indeed changed. From the dumpsite, the kids moved to the stage, big stage where they have had the opportunity to perform before big personalities including Nobel laureate, Wole Soyinka, the immediate past governor of Lagos state, Babatunde Fashola, and even the immediate State President, Goodluck Jonathan.
Waris would likely not forget how he felt the first time he performed in front of former President Jonathan.
“I have met a lot of big people that my peers only see on the television. I am proud to say that I have performed before a President. I cried because God removed me from the refuse site I called home and made me become somebody important in life,” he said.
The brothers acknowledged they probably would have been dead if they were not introduced to dance. They feel if they were lucky to be alive, they would have become gangsters because while they were living in the dumpsite, some thugs had tried to lure them into their gang.
“We saw things children shouldn’t see while we were at the dumpsite. There was a day I saw a gun with a gangster that wanted us to join a gang. If not for dance, we would have become gangsters like the boys that lived with us at the dumpsite. I am sure that if we had remained there, if we did not join them, the best we would have been in life would have been to become bus conductors. That is why we would always be grateful to Uncle Seun.”
‘Uncle Seun’, whose real name is Seun Awobajo, would later tell our correspondent his story was similar to that of the Rasheed brothers and as such, that was the primary reason he decided to uproot them from the dungeon and give them a new lease of life.
“I lost my father when I was just two years. Dance saved my life in a lot of ways. I was raised by people who were not my biological parents and I did not get to know till I was in secondary school. My colleagues in school used to tease me that my mother had married another man and I was so furious that I went to confront my surrogate mother. She explained briefly to me that I lost my father when I was about two years old and my mother absconded shortly after so she took me in.
“I discovered my passion for dance when I was in secondary school so I decided to join a cultural group. I hid this from my father parents because they would have discouraged me and told me to face his studies. Four of my friends had joined a cult group and I had considered joining too but I was preoccupied with dance. Today, those four friends are dead while I am still alive. I believe I would have been dead as well if I had joined.”
Currently the founder of Footprint of David, Awobajo explained how he met the Rasheed brothers. He said, “I used to be a member of a cultural group but after a while our group was dissolved and everybody went their way, then I went to the venue where we rehearsed and I saw some children there mimicking our dance moves. I was touched, so, I lurked in a corner and watched them. Most of them were hawkers and beggars because the venue was close to a bus stop. So I began to teach them how to dance. From then on, I began to schedule sessions with them. As the months passed on, things began to fall in place. As we grew in number, I came up with the name Footprints of David because I believed that it was proper to instil Christian virtues in the children and I am a born again Christian myself.
“At first things were rough, we had to beg people to allow us perform at churches and events. But gradually, we began to grow beyond our imagination and now, we have graced a lot of events that have allowed us see dignitaries in the society.
“When we were starting out, I noticed that most parents were nonchalant about their children staying with me. Before I induct any of the children into my group, I normally go to meet their parents. Most of their parents were delighted to get the burden off them.”
Credit: KFB
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