Tag: a

There is only one reason my wife isn’t here,” the celebrator said. It was his 70th birthday.  Before this pregnant utterance, I had wondered whether his wife was at the event at MUSON Centre, Lagos, in July 2014. When he gave the reason for her unavailability, I was struck by his openness. His wife had to provide care for their autistic son, so she couldn’t be at the celebration, he explained to his guests in Agip Hall. He added that he planned to devote his post-retirement years to speaking for Autism. It was good talk.

It’s a little over a year since the celebration and Professor Emeritus Olatunji Dare has shown that he wasn’t just talking but meant every word he said. He launched a campaign in his October 27 back-page column in The Nation titled “On a personal note”.  Dare said: “At a ceremony in July 2014 marking my 70th birthday, I pledged that after one more year on my faculty job at Bradley University, I would devote the rest of my days to raising awareness of autism and use the standing that I have earned through my professional work in classrooms and newsrooms at home and abroad to help raise funds to look after the needs of the autistic in Nigerian society. As if to confirm that autism is far more widespread in Nigeria than is generally supposed, four people walked up to me at the end of the ceremony that they had autistic children.  I have since learned of a young family that has two children, both autistic.”

It was striking that Dare not only remembered his words but also kept his word. It reflected reliability.  What may be regarded as his mission statement said: “My goal is to assist the organisations already on the ground to help raise the level of awareness of autism and situate it in the national policy dialogue, culminating in a National Summit on Autism in 2016; in short, to help build a national constituency for the autistic in Nigeria. This column signals the start of that project.”

Perhaps Dare’s autism project actually started 35 years ago. According to him, “My son Gbolahan was diagnosed with autism in 1980, shortly after I commenced doctoral studies at Indiana University, on leave from the University of Lagos, where I was a journalism instructor. He was two years old at the time. One week of tests at the Children’s Hospital, Indianapolis, confirmed the diagnosis.” By his account, Dare was “shattered”.  Who wouldn’t be?

In the years it took to arrive at this juncture, Dare was able to make a name for himself by his impressive work in classrooms and newsrooms. After a teaching period at the University of Lagos, and a stint as Chair of the Editorial Board and Editorial Page Editor for The Guardian, Dare taught journalism and international communication for 19 years at  Bradley University, Peoria, Illinois, USA,  until his retirement in May. “This institution is better for what you have contributed through your talents, energy and dedication,” Bradley University President Joanne K. Glasser said as Dare was named Professor of Communication, Emeritus.

Dare was probably describing his own torment in the face of his son’s autism when he said in his column: “…I have found cases upon cases of the condition, and bewildered parents unable to fathom the present and fearful of the future.”  It is cold comfort that, as he noted, “There are different, often overlapping forms of autism.”  His words: “The wide variation in symptoms among children with autism has led to the concept of autism spectrum disorder, or ASD. And the severity varies considerably.  At one end are those who cannot perform the most basic functions; at the other are those, the so-called idiot-savants who can perform the most astonishing feats of memory or execution but can do nothing else. Between these extremes lie gradations of autism in its many guises and disguises.”

Talking of the range of autistic possibilities, a visit to Modupe Cole Memorial Child Care and Treatment Home School, Akoka, Lagos, is sufficient to get the picture and to get Dare’s message. It is a place that prompts reflections not only on the state of the specially challenged children within its walls, but also on the wall that separates the autistic world and the world outside it.  The school’s motto, “God is Able”, is not just a reflection of the challenging circumstances of the children; it is also an expression of faith, which parents and carers need to cope with the children’s special needs.

Ultimately, this state-run school is a space of life and offers useful lessons on living that transcend the locale and the limitations of children with special needs. There is no doubt that the diversity of disabilities on display in the school compound can be mercilessly distressing. For instance, this reality is reflected by the following information in the Minutes of the school’s Parents Forum General Meeting held on Thursday, 19th June, 2014, under Principal’s Address/Report on Activities in the School: “Still on the attitudes of parents toward their children, she mentioned that, on the day the school vacated, a parent came and told the caregiver to prepare her child for her to take him home for the holiday. After a while, she cleverly left the boy and never came back till now.”

Abandonment happens, especially concerning children who are extremely dependent on others or cannot help themselves in any way. Possibly, it was maternally impossible for Dare’s wife to be with him at his 70th birthday programme at MUSON last year because of the degree of their son’s dependence on caregiving. It must be silver lining that Dare has other children. In a published interview to mark his 70th birthday, he answered a journalistic question: “Is any of your children into journalism?” Dare’s answer: “No, unfortunately. I think they have watched me struggle to put food on the table, watched me scrape and scrounge and they have watched their mother too who was a high school teacher. They have watched both of us struggle financially and I think they vowed that no, they are not going to be into that kind of thing. Our oldest son is an accountant and financial analyst with one of the big banks, another one is a school administrator in a university in Atlanta and our only daughter is a medical doctor. But our daughter, the medical doctor, is the one who is literarily-inclined. She reads voraciously and writes very well and even tries her hand writing some detective fiction, mystery novels and that stuff. So I do have one soul mate in the family.”

This is the mind that has to cope with an autistic “adult child”. Dare should be commended for his courage, the courage of acceptance, which must have essentially informed his disclosure and publicity for autism. Perhaps the most haunting line in his column was: “bewildered parents, unable to fathom the present and fearful of the future”. It is noteworthy that the United Nations General Assembly unanimously declared April 2 as World Autism Awareness Day “to highlight the need to help improve the quality of life of children and adults, who are affected by autism, so they can lead full and meaningful lives”. The day has been observed since 2008.