United Kingdom-based charity worker, Olasubomi Iginla-Aina, is the CEO of Lightup Foundation, a UK-based NGO. Among other things, Olasubomi through her NGO, has taken it upon herself to travel round some of the poorest nations of the world to give succour where necessary to the poor and downtrodden in society. The main idea, according to her, is to inspire and empower young people across the world to take actions which create positive change and real impact in their communities. But in the course of doing this, Olasubomi, an architect, also has to live her personal life. In this interview with PAUL UKPABIO, she tells us the story of how she scaled through a polygamous home to move up the ladder of life and eventually got a consultant psychiatrist as husband in the UK.
You came to Nigeria from the United Kingdom to host the sowing of what is to be known as the Biggest Bag in the World, a project for Guinness Book of World record, and you chose your alma mater as the venue. What is this love for Lagos Anglican Girls Grammar School about?
I attended Yewande Memorial School. I used to be on the debate team for my school then and I remember I used to tell my friends while I was in primary school, that I will in future attend Lagos Anglican Girls Grammar School in Surulere, Lagos, and I will be the head girl. It used to be one of the good schools then and everybody wanted to bring their children there. As soon as I got into JS 1 there, a teacher spotted me and called me, ‘head girl’. The reason is that I started carrying myself like a head girl from JSS 1, I started to get concerned about the plight of others and caring for other students and I noticed that a lot of the prefects and other students just wanted to work with me even though I was in JSS 1.
The leadership stint was in me and while I was in SS3, I was doing some studies at Yaba College of Technology at the same time, because I passed my GCE earlier. It was after the WAEC that I started preparing for GCE and luckily, I got 4As and 5Cs. A in Yoruba, A in Mathematics, A in Physics and C in all other five subjects. So, I passed my GCE early and I went further to do Poly-JAMB for Yaba-Tech and just while I was in SS2, I already had admission to Yaba Tech but I could not go because Yaba Tech had a student strike then. So, I started Yaba Tech when I was in SS3 and it was somehow cumbersome. I would come to Lagos Anglican Girls Grammar School today and tomorrow I would be in Yaba Tech.
How were you able to do all that?
Well, I grew up not having a mother and that increased my sense of urgency and sense of survival. I was doing architecture in Yaba Tech. I didn’t have a mother; I didn’t have proper guidance. I was just doing it and naturally enjoying it until one day, the HOD came to greet my new principal at Lagos Anglican Girls’ Grammar School and I was the head girl of the School despite the fact that I was studying at Yaba Tech. And because this lady was always proud of me, she said: ‘Subomi come and meet my friend’; she didn’t know I knew the woman but the woman herself didn’t know me because I was a new student at Yaba Tech; and when she extended her greetings to me and said ‘Hello’. I humbly maintained a dodgy calmness because I didn’t want her to say ‘Oh, lady, but I have seen you at Yaba Tech’. I was silently praying ‘Oh, Father God, don’t let this woman match this face with the one she sees at Yaba Tech, just let me leave this place in peace’ and I left the place. So, I have been much attached to Lagos Anglican Girls Grammar School. Again, while I was there, I desired to move to the University of Ife (OAU). I also wanted to be the Student Union President when I get there. It was another self-made decision that God helped me to actualise. And my friends said then that ‘girls don’t become presidents’ and all that, they didn’t understand me. And one day, I left Lagos for Ife.
How did that happen?
When I passed my JAMB, there was nobody to go and lobby for me. You know parents used to go to lobby for their children to say ‘Oh, this is what my kid got in school.’ There was nobody to do that. So, I just went to Ife on my own that day and I went to see the HOD at the Environment Department. When I got to his office, there was an elderly woman that sat down with me. She came to advocate for the plight of her daughter. And we were to see the HOD one after another. I was supposed to be the next person because I was there before the woman but this woman stepped in to see the HOD. I was shocked because I had been waiting patiently before the woman came. So, I went in with her and there, the woman was busy advocating and telling the HOD about her daughter and the man was saying ‘don’t worry, she will be fine bla-bla-bla’. And as she was about to leave, because the man all the while thought I was the woman’s daughter, the HOD faced me and said: ‘Young girl, don’t worry, you will be fine, you will get your admission’.
Seeing the scenario being played out, the woman said: ‘No, she is not my daughter’ and the man looked at me and I said: ‘She is not my mother’. ‘So, who are you?’ I replied him and said: ‘Sir, I actually came also to advocate for admission; I also got a good grade’. He said: ‘Where is your mother?’ I said: ‘I don’t have a mother’. He said: ‘Ah! Where is your father?’ How was I going to defend a polygamous man with over eight wives and concubines? The man said: ‘Oh, so you came on your own volition?’ and I said: ‘Yes, I also came to get admission’. The man said: ‘Just wait! Just wait!’ And he then dismissed the woman as he wrote my name down and he said: ‘I will make sure I monitor your admission and you will get admission into the school because you have everything it takes.’ When I came back, he said: ‘Oh, you are the number 9th on the admission list’ and that was how I became a student of the Architecture Department.
You later went on to become the Vice President of the Student Union, what was winning an election like there?
I wanted to be the Student Union President. I was so concerned because a lot of touts were the ones that became the SUG leaders, and they kept closing the school every time because touts were the ones leading us, they were the ones taking decisions for we that call ourselves ‘sane’. So, I felt there were some things wrong and needed change. I kept telling my friends: ‘Why should we go home because of a nuisance or somebody who feels he is all in all?’ and a lot of them were not even students. So, why should we go home as a result of people who have no life ambitions? Some of us can assume this position and influence a change’ they said ‘no, no, we don’t do that here. Apart from the fact that such position is not for a woman, they will kill you because most of them are cult guys.’
How did you overcome?
I fasted and saw in one revelation God showed to me, two moons and I saw my surname, ‘Iginla’ written between those moons. Everybody called me Shuby in school. I was tempted to use Shubby for the election but in that revelation, Iginla was the name I was given, so I needed to follow the instruction to be able to win that election; so, I used Iginla. Now, everybody had been showing off that they wanted to contest and I had just nine days to Election Day. So, I had nine days to prove to the entire Ife campus that I was around and that I can do it. I asked God what next thing to do, because I did not have any money. Omo ti ko ni iya kii legbo leyin (A motherless child cannot afford to have a sore at the back of the skin).
So, I stood up and I made my first move. A lady came into my room and I said: ‘Please, just get me chalk’ and N200 fetched us a pack of chalk, and all through that night, myself and a friend of mine in architecture wrote I-g-i-n-l-a everywhere in Ife such that there was nobody that woke up within the campus community of Ife that day that would not see Iginla, because I didn’t have money for posters. Even up to the toilets and the most hidden corners, there was no how you would wake that you would not want to brush your teeth or take your bath, you must see Iginla in every toilet, we wrote Iginla everywhere and by the time it was morning, everybody was asking ‘Who is Iginla? Because they didn’t see any poster due to my economic challenge.
But the question refused to go away! “Who is Iginla?” was the question everywhere; but on this particular occasion, I went to Adekunle Fajuyi Hall and I was speaking, telling them about my manifesto and there was this particular guy who did not interrupt my conversation. But my spirit kept going towards the guy. After talking to everybody, I got attracted to him, because he never made a comment, he was just drawing as he was in the Arts Department. So, I spoke to him that I needed a mascot. He promised to get me one by 9pm. By 9pm he knocked at my door and said ‘I am going to be the mascot’ and I said ‘I don’t have money’ he said ‘Just go and get me a white clothe and get me paint’. I don’t know how I got that money to buy paint and we did it. By the time he came out in motion ground where students went to take pictures at Ife, there were lots of camera men there. All of them, it was as if Bill Clinton was in motion ground. People were just taking pictures and there was a sudden mass attention and people started following the mascot with the name Iginla on it.
Now, God did another shocking thing. There was a lecturer called Ogunbameru, he had about 5,000 students; he was doing a general elective course. Ogunbameru mounted the stage and said ‘Look here, I don’t know who this Iginla is, but I want you people to vote for him’ (Instead of her). That was what he said because nobody knew if it was he or her, he said ‘because he (Iginla) is environmental friendly. He is a not messing up our walls, Ife is a beautiful school but you guys are messing up our halls with laminated posters and you are spending money, nobody knows where you got the money from and you are going to steal the money back when you get into power. Go and vote for Iginla because he is environmental friendly, he is using chalk to write on the wall so that when it rains, it will wash off. And Iginla will not steal your money’. The man was companying for me in front of 5,000 students and two of my friends rushed into my room, they said ‘Where did you know Ogunbameru?’ and I said ‘I don’t know him at all’. I went on to win.
So how did you move from being a Vice President to become President?
I had a revelation from God about my president, that he was about to run into crisis. I started looking for him everywhere in school. By the time I saw him, I said ‘Look here, you are about to run into error, please, be watchful of your acts from now so that you will not be removed’. He did not listen to me. One morning I was going into the Acting Department and somebody rushed to me and said ‘Subomi, hope you did not get injured?’. I said ‘injured? What happened?’ She said overnight, there was serious fight and the president was involved. Everybody was involved and there was serious pandemonium everywhere and people had been rushed to the hospital. I packed my bags in confusion and ran to Lagos; and I was terrified, I said ‘I told him’ because I saw everything that was going to happen to him in a revelation that God gave me, so I knew the severity. Within the next 24 hours, I was by the radio listening to the crisis, that Ife had scattered and everything had gone bad.
I knew there was going to be a parliamentary sitting that night; within that 24 hours, the PRO of OAU was in Lagos; he came to my house but didn’t meet me and he wrote ‘The die is cast, the mantle has fallen, you are now the President of Ife SUG’ You must report within 24 hours to Ife.’ That was how I emerged the President of Obafemi Awolowo University Student Union Government ; and from there, God started helping me and I realised that He had actually deposited a lot in me which I had even identified when I was in secondary school. I will enter into an election room, for a club for which I am not a member and I will be chosen. I was the President of Jet; I was the president of Red Cross; I was the President of Arts and Craft; I was the head girl. I later realised that I will get somewhere and something will happen and I will have to replace the leader. It has happened not once, not twice and I realised that it was a calling I had to live with.
You later relocated abroad?
I actually started Lightup Foundation here. I was involved in a lot of charity projects not directly with the Federal Government; I was just doing my own thing. I was able to use my funds to do a lot of things for the people. By God’s grace I had a very rich father who left wealth for his 41 children. My father, Alhaji Alade Iginla, made each one of us a millionaire in naira through his ‘shares.’
What number are you among the children?
I think he had many wives and my mother’s position I wouldn’t know because she passed on when I was very young. I don’t even know which number I am as his child. In 2005, there was draught in Niger Republic and I volunteered myself as a charity worker over there. I felt there were lots of wealthy Nigerians who have money but wouldn’t spend. So, if I have money, I should be able to use it to serve humanity. There was a day I called my insurance broker and I said to him: ‘I wanted to withdraw a large sum of money’ and the guy had to sit me down, he wanted to be sure it was not 419 people that were working on me. He said: ‘What do you want to use this money for? I said: ‘don’t you hear that people are dying in Niger Republic and I have shares? Let’s sell the shares and get food for them. And I sold the shares and got the money.
I volunteered for Nigeria and we bought food from the Northern parts of Nigeria and took it there. We went to several provinces and localities. We met the governor of the capital of a state, we met chiefs and traditional rulers there and they supported us well. We distributed foods in all the communities, the capital and all the rest. We met UNICEF, we met Washington Post and they interviewed me, it was very colorful. In fact I got to Republic of Niger and I heard somebody say ‘Iginla’ and I looked back, I said ‘Who knows me here?’ And it was actually an Ife student who was guiding Washington Post on assignments and it was really a wonderful experience. Later I decided to travel to America; I prayed that God should direct me to America. I wanted to be sure if that was the direction from God, I didn’t want to go to a place where I am not supposed to be. But I prepared documents to submit to the UK embassy because my mind wanted America, I acted in the flesh, I didn’t know when I addressed all my letters and documents to the US consular officer and I submitted it to UK consular officer. You can see the confusion of course. US was what I wanted but I was forced by the will of God and it was submitted to the UK consular officer. I didn’t know how they didn’t see it, they did not deny that visa. I was going there for the first time and I applied for two years and they gave me two years.
