Today, Bola Ahmed Tinubu is the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
In a country with huge population of over 200 million, achieving such feat must have come through hard work, luck and God’s grace.
For Tinubu, life has always been a difficult terrain. In the midst of the difficulties, Tinubu survived and triumphed both in private and public sectors; becoming oil executive, senator, governor and president.
In his quest for education in the United States of America, it was not rosy. To survive as a student at the Chigaco State University, Tinubu became door guard, security man and cab driver.
In an interview he granted TheNEWS magazine for his 60th birthday, Tinubu shared his humble beginning.
As cab driver, President Tinubu had two rough encounters. One, a naval officer slapped him for unintentionally overcharging the officer. On another occasion, a drunk passenger pointed gun at him instead of given him money.
He recalled: “We got an unregistered used car commonly called Gypsy, which we ran as a taxi. Driving Gypsy cab was aimed at getting additional money to what I had….
“I was supposed to have started schooling in April. I deferred it till September in order to have more money. Immediately I got to Chicago, I went straight to Richard Daley College. It was very interesting. I was able to pay for my apartment and tuition fees at Chicago State University. I supplemented that by doing different menial jobs like door guard and security man.”
For Mr President, life as cabbie and security man wasn’t easy.
According to him, “As a cab driver, one experience I will never forget was when I over-charged a naval officer who was returning to the country. It was not intentional. Apparently, I didn’t know the direction. There was no GPRS in those days to locate directions. So, he gave me the direction to his house in a Virginia suburb. I gave him the price and the man responded with a slap to my face. He said I should know the correct price to charge to the location he mentioned. He slapped me and gave me the money.
“Another experience was when I took a guy whom I didn’t know was drunk. When I drove to his house, he pointed a gun at me instead of paying the fare. He took my leather jacket and said: ‘Get into your car and get lost.’ He did not pay.
“Another interesting one was when I was taking the third Accounting class and equally working as a security guard at a construction site. They were very serious with their kind of security. You just had to do that job. There were about six points with six clocks at the site, which the security man must wind every hour and with a dog in hand. So, there was never a chance of trying to catch a nap. As I was doing my Accounting assignment, I fell asleep. I was dead asleep! The inspector came to the site and found me sleeping, with my head on my books. He simply pulled the register and wrote: ‘I have been here. You were sound asleep. So, see me tomorrow.’
“When I woke up, I found that Skiddo (the dog’s name) was gone, and then the register. I just went to a corner, cleaned my face and concentrated on my assignment because I knew the job was already gone. You can’t lose two things. I ensured that I read well for my test and passed the next day. I opted to post their uniform and the cap to them, but suddenly ran into the man and he handed me my cheque and said the job was gone. I told him I knew and we said goodbye to each other! I had to start looking for another job.”
Though it was quite challenging, in the end Tinubu graduated top of his class as Accounting major. Then big eight accounting firms in the United States, including Arthur Andersen, Arthur Young, Ernst and Whinney, Peat Marwick and Mitchell, Deloitte and others sought after him.
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