‘I Feel Fulfilled Holding My SSCE Result’ — Woman Who Finished Secondary School Aged 60 Says

Mama Habiba Samanja, an old woman who recently finished secondary school at LCCN Cathedral Memorial College Comprehensive, Yola, Adamawa state on August 9th, 2023 is marking her 60th birthday today, tagging it a happy moment and a great achievement holding her National Examinations Council (NECO) result in her hand.

Samanja said she can’t describe how happy and fulfilled she feels at the moment, as “my dreams have finally come true,” she told THE WHISTLER, sounding happily over the phone.

Recall THE WHISTLER reported that Mama Samanja, a widow who lost her husband about 19 years ago, was left with two children whom she trained through farming and a meagre salary earned as a cleaner working with LCCN Cathedral.

She said she has two children and the highest level of school attained by the older child was Federal College of Education (FCE), while the other one stopped at secondary school level.

Samanja said despite lack of funds, she still managed to encourage her children to further their academics but they both refused.

She said: “My kids refused to further their education. I did my best for them to see that I pushed them to study further, but they refused. One of them just stopped at FCE, while the other at secondary school level.

“I told them that even if you obtain knowledge from school and you’re unable to get a job with it, it’s still useful to you. One day God can open opportunities for you.

“Sometimes you may even be sitting with people and they will ask if you’ve gone to school and if you say yes, they will tell you to bring your certificate, and by the time they see that your result is good, they’ll give you a job.”

The birthday celebrant said she further advised her children to see the importance of education because it will make people respect them.

According to her: “People will not look down on you if you go to school. And if people are looking down on you but later realise that you’ve gone to school, they will respect you,” she added.

The widow said despite all she said, her advice to her children fell on deaf ears, and because of that, she summoned the courage to go to school at old age just to set an example for them about the need for school.

She said: “But my children refused to go to school. One of them even got an admission to study in a higher institution of learning, but still refused to go. This is why I picked up the challenge to go to school and set an example for them to see.

Laughing at how funny the children sounded, Samanja said one of them got disturbed after seeing Samanja graduate and wants to go back to school, “but the other one said he will not further his studies until he gets married. Imagine? Until I marry him off?

“Now that I’m done with secondary school, they are encouraging me to go ahead and do my diploma, but I’m yet to decide where I want to study. I wish to study further especially looking at how good my result is,” Samanja said.

She said she is not only advising her own children to go back to school, but including other youths out there.

She said: “There are some young girls that are in school but have dropped out because of marriage, these types of girls are supposed to go back and finish their studies.”