By Adeola YUSUF
No, I didn’t make our shared dream of becoming a medical doctor. Fate, that silent architect of near-misses, dragged me like a leaf in a storm — through Owode Idiroko, through Owode Egba, through the storm and through the lull; through tears that fell like rain and through cheers that rang like bells. But ehm, ehm… it landed me a doctorate degree in Communication Studies instead.
Armed with conviction and the good news of distinctions in Chemistry, Biology, Agricultural Science and others in WAEC — a result our late principal declared one of the best in our entire district — Baami held my hand. He marched me to Odomode Medicine Store in Owode Yewa with one aim burning in his eyes: to make his son a medical doctor.
The man of near-zero formal education wanted the very best for all his children. The bill for that dream? He didn’t have it. The wherewithal? He didn’t know it. Yet every supplication ended with his trademark “Ola ino ataino.” No prayer session led by my father passed without him begging God to crown his son with the title “Doctor.” He needed that like an elderly alfa needed at least on front tooth to crunch masa. He wanted that for impact and he wanted that so seriously.
He couldn’t foot the bill for a university education — the bedrock of becoming a medical doctor. Still, he could drag me to a patent medicine shop even after I emerged as the overall best student in science. As they say, a win is a win, even if it’s a bitter-sweet one.
The pre-WAEC era was neither rosy nor a smooth ride. It was a narrow bridge over troubled waters. But just as different Moses rose for every Pharaoh, God raised angels for me.
The first was my mum, Alhaja wa — Baami’s darling wife and the true definition of submissiveness. For years I didn’t know she was quietly bankrolling my education. She wouldn’t only give through Baami; she would beg him, in a whisper, not to let us know he wasn’t footing the bill alone. She was the silent oxygen behind our survival.
The second was Alhaji Odugbemi. The late High Chief of Owode Yewa, on his 70th birthday, commissioned a scholarship for the overall best SS1 student of Area Community High School — right when my funding from JSS 1 to JSS 3 was gasping for breath. Guess who won scholarship? God, again, stitched my senior secondary education together.
Then came the late Mr. Ayanpitan, a neighbor of favor. He didn’t give money. He gave advice that cut like a scalpel and healed like balm. The retired headmaster became a gentle pressure on Baami. “I am fascinated by how this village boy speaks English,” he said. My English probably had K-legs then, but to him, it sounded like music from 200 kilometers away. “Baba, do something about this boy’s education,” he urged in Yoruba, the language they both understood very well. And so began that infamous journey to Odomode Store.
At my lowest ebb, Sheikh Najeemdeen Adesina Ajani Yusuf stepped in. My brother who became a father-figure took me in when it was hardest. He had a young family and a tight budget, yet he brought me from Owode to Abeokuta. He couldn’t afford a university then, but he sponsored me through National Diploma and Higher National Diploma at Moshood Abiola Polytechnic, MAPOLY. In return, I assisted him and his wife — a woman of valor and values — at the Aduralongba Medicine Store.
Listening to the late Gbenga Adeboye and his mastery of words was like pouring petrol on fire. By the time I sat for JAMB, medicine had slipped from my mind like sand through fingers. I chose Mass Communication. The admin office was thunderstruck when I submitted a WAEC result dripping with science distinctions to study a course far from the lab.
Lo and behold, the storm swallowed me. Within a few years of my HND, while I was still wrestling to make ends meet, Baami died. Alhajawa died. Before I could say Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’un, my dream of becoming a medical doctor crashed to the ground like glass.
My heart was lacerated. Hope vanished. Darkness draped the world. Then God, in His bittersweet mercy, gave me Fateemah – a wife and beautiful pillar of support. He also surrounded me with friends like Adegbuyi Adebayo, Dr. Damilare Shoye, Adewale Sanyaolu, Sulaimon Salau, Dr. Rafiu Ajakaye, Yunus Afobaje Yusuf, Oluwatosin Balogun, Odenike Timothy Omolaso; family; classmates like Dr. Khadijat Olona, Dr. Adedeji Oluwatoyin Salami, Dr. Taiwo Okeowo, Dr. Folarin Jamiu; and colleagues like Ganiu Olatunji, Abibat Babalola, Opeseitan Joseph Tunde, Fuhad Saheed, Olafioye Olakunle, Abolade S Sokunbee, Akogun Tunde Lawal, and others; who became lanterns in my night.
I crawled back to school, enrolled – after my HND – for BSc. in Mass Communication at Crescent University Abeokuta; climbed to the University of Lagos (UNILAG) for my MSc; frequented the School of Media and Communication, Pan-Atlantic University for two Masters in Oil and Gas Reporting; and finally journeyed to the Lagos State University (LASU) for my Ph.D.
That last degree, which takes most people three years, took me eight. I gave up four times. The first was when I slumped — story for another day. The second was when my supervisor, Professor Lai Oso, died in an auto crash on the Benin-Sagamu Expressway. Dr. Hassan Brave Olalekan told me how the late Prof, hours before the crash, kept calling my number, agitated that he couldn’t get through. He seemed had something he wouldn’t send through a third ear. Ha. That was a personal earthquake.
And again, God showed mercy. He used Professor Jide Jimoh and Professor Rotimi Williams Olatunji to finish the work. At Professor Oso’s lying-in-state, when I swore “never again” to a Ph.D, Professor Olatunji — then Dean of the Faculty of Communication and Media Studies — looked at me and said, “Come and see me in school on Monday.” How did he read the storm in my head?
Professor Jimoh joined him. For three more years, these two heavyweights — one immediate-past Dean, one new Dean — kept their eyes like hawks on my work. It was tough. Painfully, beautifully tough. No typo escaped their red pens. No weak argument survived their questions.
My thesis — about a thousand pages titled “Press Reportage of Oil and Gas Issues in Nigeria: 2017-2021”— was on the energy sector, an area I thought was my turf. But the Professors, joined by my reader, Professor Tunde Akanni, and their “LASU people” — what we call them when the wahala becomes unbearable — made me realize I knew next to nothing about what I thought I knew.
On Wednesday, August 18, 2026 — after a successful viva on June 6, 2025 — the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo Olu, the Visitor to LASU, led dignitaries including his deputy, Dr. Obafemi Hamzat; the Ooni of Ife, Oba Enitan Ogunwusi; and the Vice Chancellor, Professor Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, to officially announce yours truly as a proud holder of a Ph.D in Communication Studies, with a bias for energy communication.
It was a rough, tough, but victorious journey. Hot tears rolled down my cheeks as I shook hands with Sanwo-Olu, Hamzat, Olatunji-Bello, the Ooni, and other dignitaries. O mase o… Baami was not there. Alhajawa was not there. They won’t be here again. And no matter how many barrels of tears I shed, I will never hear people call them Baba Doctor and Mama Doctor.
I have asked others to dedicate Surat Ikhlas for those who labored but didn’t eat the fruit. But if you see Baami in your dreams, tell him his son is now a Doctor. Rest assured, he will be so overjoyed he won’t even remember to ask if it was a medical doctor or a Doctor of Philosophy.
In every situation — including this — Baami Al’Akande would thunder: “Alhamdulillah!” And he would make that word of gratitude sound like do-do-mi-mi-mi-do-do!
To God alone be the glory.
Love for All. Hatred for None!
Sincerely,
Adeola Yusuf, Ph.D, Team Lead of Platforms Africa
I will gladly answer if you simply call me doctor!
