A man has reportedly disappeared on his family after his wife, Balikis Popoola, gave birth to a set of triplets.
Mrs. Popoola had been abandoned by her husband after she was delivered of the children – two boys and a girl – six months ago.
Now, the woman is crying out for help.
She also disclosed that life had been extremely difficult since she gave birth to the unexpected bundles of joy as she had been with no stable source of income to take care of the babies.
Speaking at the Ogun State secretariat of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Oke Ilewo, Abeokuta, the 25-year old petty trader said the triplets are her second birth. She added that she had her first child 11 years ago.
“I had the babies through caesarian operation at a private hospital at Olorunsogo, Abeokuta. Our medical bills was N300,000 and as soon as my husband, Mr. Samson Popoola, a cassava flour miller at Lafenwa market heard about this, he pretended as if he was going to look for the money but since then he has been nowhere to be found while his phone has been switched off,” she said.
Balikis revealed that as part of effort to pay up this debt, she had been going about some churches in Abeokuta to beg for money.
She disclosed further that the Medical Director of the private hospital where she gave birth to the children wrote off the debt on humanitarian grounds since she couldn’t pay up the balance.
Balikis said her petty trading business had collapsed under the heavyweight of the financial demand needed to take care of the kids, stressing that the triplets had survived till date on the benevolence of relatives and people around her.
She said,
“All I am asking from our government and all Nigerians is help such that I can have a steady source of income to take care of the triplets and their elder brother, Daniel whose Dad is late.
“I won’t also mind if I can get scholarships for them. I really want to do my best to ensure that they are educated and become great people in the future since I didn’t go to school”.
Balikis also revealed that she had paid several visits to Yinka Ayefele’s radio station in Abeokuta since the birth of the children trying to seek help, but that his workers did not allow her access to the musician, adding, “they keep telling me he is not around even when I see him going into the radio station.”
