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| Adalabu Seribor |
A 60-year-old man, Mr. Adalabu Seribor,
who is a Junior Secondary School II (JSS II) student at Izon College,
Bomadi-Overside in Bomadi Local Government Area of Delta State, is
currently the talk of the town.
Seribor, a wheelbarrow pusher popularly
called Oyibo in the community, disclosed how he took the decision to go
to school at old age, a development that had kept many people wondering
what he wanted to achieve in school at such an age.
Speaking with Southern City News,
Seribor said, “I am sixty years now and I decided to go to school at
this age because I perpetually feel the pain of being an illiterate in
this modern world where everything has to do with English and education.
“My mother died during child birth when I
was a little boy while my father was a hunter. I was bred by a
grandmother after the death of my mother and later taken to a
step-mother when my father remarried.
“I went through pains and hardship at my
tender age to adulthood. It would interest you to know that I was so
tender at the time my mother died that I was crying for food while she
lay dead. “I went through struggles all through my
life history. I had the opportunity to go to school at my young age,
when a relative who was a magistrate at Ekeremor in Bayelsa State took
me to his house.
“But because of early morning beatings
due to my failure to greet him when rising from bed, I went back to my
father. I had no opportunity to go to school since then, and continued
in hard labour to survive in life, which I am still doing.”
Narrating further how he took the
decision to attend school at his current age, he said, “I realized that
without education, one cannot do well in this present society. I also do
not want a situation whereby someone else would interpret or write for
me if eventually I am chosen to hold an office in my community.
“I make a living by pushing wheelbarrow.
After school hours, I go back home to look for work to do, which I have
been doing for a living. I pay my school fees from there. I am
determined to complete my education because of the pains in my heart.
“I see that one cannot do well without
education in this society. I do various menial jobs for a living. I pack
dirt from gutters; I pack sand, clear grasses in people’s compounds and
pack soak-away faeces in the dead of the night. I am a JSS II student
and by the grace of God, I will finish from this school.”
Seribor said he would proceed to
Teachers’ Training College at the end of his secondary education in
order to achieve his dream of becoming a teacher.
“I want to teach and I advised young boys and girls wasting their time and years roaming the streets
to go to school. If I can go to school, then why are young people wasting themselves,” he queried.
His class teacher, Mr. Edsemi Anesah, described Seribor as a committed and hardworking student.
“My encouragement to him is that he
should hold onto his determination. He is the oldest student in the
school and I advise young people out there to emulate him,” Anesah
added.
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