Abandoned at one, emerges best pupil at 17

A 17-year-old boy, Ismail Razaq, abandoned by his mother when he was one, has emerged the best pupil in mathematics and sciences in his school.

Razaq is among the 2014 graduating pupils of the International College, Ibefun, Ogun State.

Razaq, who repeated Senior Secondary School one because of his poor performance in Mathematics and English, was the star of the pack during the recent graduation of the school.

Appreciating the efforts of his grandmother, who sponsored his education, Rasaq said he would love to see his mother.

He said, “It will be my joy to see my mother. I do not know her. I cannot identify her and I know she should be alive. I am always sad when I remember my past but I have learnt not to allow that to distract me.

“It has not been so easy to live without my mother but my grandmother has been one in a million to me. She is indeed a saviour and she has been very encouraging. I will do anything to make her proud. She gave me what she did not have. She is not educated but insisted that I must be educated.”

Razaq, while advising other pupils, enjoined not to allow challenges to deter them from accomplishing their life desires.

“When I repeated class, my friends made fun of me and I prayed to God to give me the courage to surmount my challenges. I have learnt many lessons from that, part of which is that when a person repeats a class, he should not give up; instead, the person should work harder.

“It was a very bad experience. I repeated class because I failed Mathematics and English Language. But today, I have emerged as the best student in one of the subject.”

The Director of the school, Dr. Patience Osinubi, said her father, Pa Babatunde Taiwo, established the college to support the education of the less privileged children in the area.

She said, “My father sees every child in Ibefun as his child and wants to give them qualitative training. He believes that material things will perish but good legacy will not. He painfully trained himself from six years old and made many sacrifices. Seeing pupils graduating out of the school today is a success story. They are the first set and we are proud of their performance.”

She, however, urged the graduating pupils to worker harder, promising to offer scholarship to those of them who secure admission to the university.

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