Omon-Julius Onabu in Asaba
Nigerian Turkish Alumni Association has appealed to good-spirited and well-to-do Nigerians to be more supportive of less privileged compatriots through financial and material assistance to ameliorate their situations.
International Coordinator of the association, Mr Frisky Larr (Friday Agbonlahor), made the appeal at the Agulu General Hospital in Anambra State, where the philanthropy unit of the Turkish Old Boys Association (TOBA) made donations to about 20 neonatal infants and nursing mothers recently.
Larr noted that the association, comprising friends who attended different tertiary institutions in Türkiye (fornerly Turkey) in the last few decades, had resolved to move beyond their seasonal dinner gathering, to “touching lives and putting smiles on faces of less privileged members of our society” hence the donations.
He said it was regrettable that some Nigerian women would give birth but were sometimes held hostage by the hospital because they had no money to immediately offset the hospital bills, thereby turning the joy usually associated with childbirth to sorrow, beside the traumatic experience particularly for the nursing mother.
He said, “On behalf of the Philanthropy Platform of the Turkish Old Boys Association and on behalf of my colleague, Dr John Okoye, an alumnus of a Turkish university, I am happy to welcome you all to this noble occasion.
“As the year 2023 winds down, we are all privileged to have lived through one more year in our lives. The gift of waking up daily, having jobs to do, earning money for our upkeep, and finding food to eat day-in, day-out, cannot be taken for granted. We are thankful to the almighty God for facilitating this luxury. Of course, there are people who have no jobs to do for a living even though they have learnt their trade and struggled to find a job.
“There are people who have no food to eat even though they strive to earn a living to feed themselves. Above all else, there are people, who do not even wake up from their sleep and sadly breathe their last air while taking a rest to close the day. (May their souls all rest in peace).
“In the natural cycle of life, new souls are born while other souls depart. We are here today, to welcome our new-born babies to this hard, unfair world of unwanted tribulations. May all new-born babies in this new month be baptized with the cloak of success, and blessings all the days of their lives.
“We, of the Turkish Alumni Association, are graduates of different universities in Turkey (now called Türkiye). Some of us returned back to Nigeria and struggling to earn a living. Some of us are spread across different countries of the world, including Türkiye itself. With the limited resources we are been able to gather, we reach out to less privileged people like us every year end in different parts of Nigeria.
“To mark the end of the year 2023, we organized activities in Abuja FCT, Anambra and Lagos states. Here in Anambra today, we wish to welcome a few new-born babies with a token to appreciate their arrival. May they all have a blessed life throughout the years they will spend on earth.”
Dr Okoye also said, “Going forward, the association is mulling the idea of offering scholarship to brilliant but indigent Nigerian children in the near future as well as identifying indigent people with a view to helping them pay their hospital bills and so save them the embarrassing experience of being held hostage by hospitals because they are unable to pay their bills.”
The Chief Medical Officer of the General Hospital Agulu, Dr. Chukwudi Onwughambu, and Mr Ike Okoye, who conveyed the goodwill message of the donors to the hundreds of people who witnessed the ceremony, described the initiative as kind and thoughtful and one that would go a long way to complement the two-day annual free medical outreach of Friends’ Forum Agulu in the locality.
One of the benefiting mothers at Agulu, Mrs Chisom Udekwe, expressed happiness about the gesture and commended the Turkish alumni group for the show of love, adding that her baby, Mmaduabuchi would echo her gratitude if he could talk yet.
She said the pains being suffered today by the less privileged would be significantly mitigated if more well-to-do Nigerians showed love Iike the Turkish alumni association, adding that “God will surely bless those who give others joy in their hearts this way”.
Anawim Home, a charity centre for the “poorest of the poor” run by Missionary Sisters in Gwagwalada, Abuja Federal Capital Territory (FCT), and Royal Diamond Orphanage Home located in Ojodu Area of Lagos State are among beneficiaries of the 2023 year-end philanthropic projects of the Nigerian-Turkish alumni body otherwise called TOBA.
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