•‘Some passengers don’t ride with me. They say they don’t want to die early’
By Lawrence Enyoghasu
Kehinde Olaide Akins, a 30-year-old commercial tricycle operator rides with the dexterity of a professional. From afar, nothing whatsoever suggests he is physically challenged. But he is paralysed in the leg.
Over time, Akins, also known as Kenny, has proved that disability does not reside in the body but in the mind. He has shown that disability hardly limits the determined fellow.
Although Kenny lost his legs long before now, he vowed never to go begging, insisting that there is dignity in labour. Kenny is a popular face in Ajah, Lagos, where he resides and plies his trade, as an operator of a commercial tricycle, otherwise known as Keke Marwa.
He said this was a trade he started when all odds were against him. He said he had a rough patch when he was evicted alongside his friend from his previous accommodation. And then, all he had were just two pairs of trousers and a few shirts.
“I was not comfortable with the fact that a young man like me would wake up in the morning and not have anything to do other than to eat and sleep.
“So, one day, I got up and went straight to the bus stop. I walked up to a guy and frantically asked him to teach me to ride Keke Marwa. The guy was blunt, but I was not surprised. He told me that keke was not made for people like me. But after much persuasion, he agreed to teach me the trade, and I learnt fast.
“After he was satisfied that I could ride the machine perfectly well, he took me to where I got keke to operate on hire-purchase. I got the keke shortly before December 2015, but I have paid N620,000 out of the N750, 000, which was the actual cost of the tricycle. Each day, I make a return of about N5,000.”
But how do passengers feel being ferried by a physically challenged fellow? “I get mixed feelings from people,” he noted. “Some give me accolades for trying to better my lot, but some dare not board my tricycle. When I persuade them to ride with me, they tell me that they don’t want to die early.”
If seeing Kenny operating a tricycle is shocking, how he manoeuvres it is a spectacle.
A tricycle has a clutch, hand brake, brake pedal and starter. The clutch, hand brake and starter can be operated with the hand. The brake pedal that is always on the right side needs to be operated with the leg. In other for Kenny to be able to ride it, he must at least have one of his legs working. But he operates the right brake pedal with the biggest left toe.
“I use my left foot to step on the brakes on the right. My right limb is totally paralysed, but my left has some muscles that still work.”
Music career
There is also another part of Kenny that many do not know about. He is also a singer, blessed with a melodious voice. At the moment, he is referred to as the next Yinka Ayefele, the popular Yoruba musician.
“It was my late mother who first noticed that I could sing. Before I was paralysed, she would call me to mime along with Shina Peters, Adewale Ayuba and Haruna Ishola whenever their songs were being played on radio. She continued to encourage me before she died,” he stated.
His journey to paralysis
When this Oyo State indigene was born alongside his twin brother, his two legs were good. He said then, he nursed the hope of playing for the national team, the Golden Eaglets, in future. But little did he know that things would one day fall apart, a development that left his six siblings and single mother, the late Mrs. Muyibat Gbadamosi, totally distraught.
He recalled how his life and hope plummeted the year he clocked 12. According to him, he simply went to bed but by the time he woke up, he was already getting crippled. Everything that followed was inexplicable.
“It was a tough day to remember. A day before the night, I was paralysed, I played with my twin brother, Taye. We were playing together that night before I went to bed and slept off. I slept in between him and my elder, Jelilah. Our late mother was not around that night.
“While I slept, I felt thirsty and needed to drink water. When I stood up to get the water to drink, I could not move to get it. So, I woke my sister; I told her to help me get water, but she, feeling sleepy, told me to get up and take it by myself.
“Then I told her that I could not move my legs. And I was serious. That was how it all began,” he recalled.
All efforts to get him cured proved fruitless, even though his mum did all she could to get him back on his feet.
“The first hospital my mother took me to rejected me. After they carried out numerous tests, the doctor told my mother to seek traditional help. She took me to two herbalists, two churches and four hospitals,” Kenny also recalled.
He said he experienced a lot of hate while growing up. Parents, he said, restrained their children from playing with him. But he remains hopeful and still forges on, in spite of the intolerable attitude of many towards him.
Women and sexual life
Kenny said that despite being a cripple, he experienced normal sexual attraction. But he said he wasn’t ready for women at the moment.
“The type of women I like, I need to have money to keep them,” he explained. “I have dated, at least, five women in my life. So, they are not my problem for now. What I need now is regular income. Thereafter, I would marry a woman of my choice.”