100 Indigent Students Benefit from Okunbo’s Scholarship in Edo

Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City

About 100 pupils and students, including Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Edo State on Wednesday were awarded scholarship, courtesy of the children of late Captain Hosa Wells Okunbo.

The scholarship was in remembrance of the 64th posthumous birthday of the late philanthropist, who passed on in September last year.

Speaking at the ceremony, wife of the Olu of Warri, Olori Atuwatse III, and first daughter of the late philanthropist, urged the benefiting pupils to emulate the life of her late father, who she said was not born with a silver spoon but made it through hard work and determination.

She explained that the selected pupils and student for the scholarship were from public schools whose parents could afford to pay their fees.

Flanked by her siblings, other family members and heads of schools, Olori Atuwatse III said: “Captain Hosa was many things to many people. My father went to school in this city, my mother went to St. Maria Goretti Girls Grammar School, so I want to encourage you to be determined like him.

“My father was one of the children in the family of eleven, his parents were teachers so he was not born with a silver spoon but through hard work, dedication and determination he rose to be a man of great impact and great value so I want you take this as an encouragement.

“Look at him and know that this is the same Benin City that he grew up in and you are growing up in. You have all it takes to make it and impact on the society.

“Education is so important to us and we decided to put this together to mark his posthumous 64th birth we know we can do feeding but the food will get finished, we can build a road but the road will get bad someday and it came to me, why don’t we invest in lives, why don’t transform lives, why don’t we ensure that pupils can go to school so that the multiplier effects will be felt.

“Although, we have touched one hundred lives today but I dare say we have touched a hundred thousand lives.”

Earlier, the Olori’s younger brother and first son of Okunbo, Osahon Okunbo said Nigeria invested in his late father through earned scholarships and, “he always referenced that to let people know that and wanted to always give back because of what Nigeria did for him and this is one way we can continue that and to honour him.

“You should begin to ensure that you are the best. Always give more than you take, try to be selfless and for every decision you take, always ask yourself how that decision will benefit your community.

“If all of us can do that, we will have a better state, we will have a better community and you would have embodied the values my father stood for.”