A 10-year-old cobbler, Hameed Mojeed, has stated that he engaged in the repairs of shoes to sponsor his primary education.
Mojeed, who is a primary three pupil of Methodist Primary School, Adatan in Abeokuta, told Punch Metro that he was the first child of a broken home.
He also said that he had engaged in the trade for three years, adding that he learnt the trade when he was four years and graduated at the age of seven. He said he had been mending shoes on the major streets of Abeokuta since 2007.
He said, “I live with my paternal grandmother in Abeokuta and I repair shoes to fend for myself and sponsor my education".
“I engage in this trade during weekends and on holidays. Sometimes when I close from school, I quickly move around to repair shoes. I make between N600 and N1,200 per day, which I give to my grandmother for our upkeep.”
He said that his grandmother engaged in a menial job, washing locust beans at the river side for survival.
The cobbler, who lamented poor parental care, blamed the development on a broken marriage.
He said that his father, a trailer driver in Lagos State hardly visited him, adding that occasionally when he did, he only gave him N100 for his upkeep.
He said, “My mother, Isiwatu, has not been visiting me but whenever my father calls, he gives me N100, though not every time.”
As expected, Mojeed’s business is having a telling effect on his education as the primary three pupil said that he took 23rd position out of the 25 pupils in his class in the last term examination.
He said that he sponsored his education from his earnings as a cobbler.
Though he was not categorical on whether he was the one responsible for the feeding of his grandmother, he explained that his daily income was usually given to the woman.
Mojeed, who claimed that he learnt the trade from an uncle in the Adatan area of Abeokuta for three years, said that his grandmother asked him to do the job to make ends meet without his father’s knowledge.
“I have no shop, I always walk from one place to the other to mend shoes for people, it is when I am going home at night that I board a taxi back to my home,” Mojeed said.
Though he appeared not disturbed by his poor performance in school, he insisted that he was interested in becoming an engineer in future.
Coiled from The Punch New paper. (www.punchng.com)
