For the past two years or thereabouts, the Agbaakin of Gbongan, High Chief Belau Owolabi has been off and on optical service centres in search of a solution to his sight, which was then suffering progressive deterioration.
The effort, including a try at alternative medicine suggested by his people and which had gulped a sum of N50000, yielded no fruit, hence his resolve to accept his fate and move on with life, a euphemism of losing all hope of regaining his hitherto clear sight.
However, his attention was drawn to the Favour, Kindness and Grace Foundation, a humanitarian service provider funded incidentally by an indigene of Gbongan, Omoba Dotun Babayemi.
The foundation in 2014 was disturbed by the alarming rate of visually impaired cases in Osun State, an awareness which resulting in eye test exercise and subsequently free eye surgery to the patients who suffered advanced glaucoma.
Chief Owolabi was full of praise in his bed at a specialized eye hospital in Ijebu-Mushin, Ogun State, after the successful surgery, lamenting his failed attempts in the past and thanking Babayemi for coming to his aid when, according to him, it mattered most. He said he was in his 70s, an age which he considered not too old to lose the function of his sight.
“I am not too old to lose my sight; that was why I was disturbed by the problem until Omoba Babayemi gave me this rare opportunity. I thought there was no more hope after I had spent N50,000 but seen no result. I don’t have any other thing to give him than praying for him everyday for saving me from blindness,” he said.
Equally excited was another Septuagenarian patient who was accompanied to the hospital by his wife. The man, Ezekiel Ajayi, traced the history of his impairment to seven years when he suddenly discovered he could hardly see objects clearly.
A truck driver, Ajayi said he had first thought the nature of his job which exposed him to light on a night journey, was the cause until test proved otherwise. Like Chief Owolabi, Ajayi also tried some medications, none of which, he recalled, was effective, some of which even aggravated the problem until the foundation subjected him to screening, leading to his journey to Ijebu-mushin.
“If I must tell you, I have been to the UCH (University College Hospital) in Ibadan to tell you that I did not take it for granted. The UCH tried on the right eye but the left is in very bad condition until we were brought here. I am very happy for Omoba Babayemi for spending his money on us. People like him will improve the country if they are in the affairs of the nation. He will not suffer in life,” he prayed.
About 220 patients were brought to the hospital on the same day, all of whom have undergone relevant surgeries. The premises of the hospital were filled with coastal buses which brought the patients while each of them was accompanied by a member of his or her family on the bill of the foundation.
100 women benefit from complete care food against hunger support
The palaces of traditional rulers including that of the Oluwo of Iwo, Oba AbdulRasheed Akanbi were used as screening centres, an idea which, according to the foundation, aided the result recorded in the exercise during which no fewer than 27,000 patients were screened.
Babayemi urged those who could not make it to the theatre at the just-concluded trip to be steadfast with an assurance that it would get to their turn in July when another set would be given an opportunity to also benefit from the scheme.
Clarifying his mission against likely critique, Babayemi said his passion for good health had no string attached as a politician and indeed member of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC), adding that welfare of his people comes first before any other thing because good health naturally translates to a healthy population.
“On this health issue, politics is secondary and that is the truth. I am not denying that I am a member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Osun State, but the issue at hand now is beyond politics because the patients were not screened according to political parties they belong or the parties which they have sympathy for.
“We should not reduce everything to politics in order to encourage well intentioned, genuine Nigerians to also offer humanitarian services to the underprivileged people of the society. I am, therefore, saying it categorically that what we are doing here is not politically motivated,” he said.
He expressed his appreciation to the traditional rulers in his senatorial district for understanding shown in the use of their palaces as screening centres for the patients. The royal fathers, he recalled, encouraged their subjects to participate in the screening exercise.
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