Dr. Raphael James is the founder and Director General of the Centre for Research, Information Management and Media Development (CRIMMD), Ejigbo, Lagos. Asides that, he is renowned for his philanthropy for which he has received numerous awards. With the recent lockdown in Lagos State due to the Covid-19 scourge that has left many with no hope of survival, Dr James took it upon himself to put smiles on the faces of people in his community. In this interview with JOY NGWOLO, he speaks on his motivations.
Recently you distributed food items to people in your neighbourhood, what motivated you to do it?
I did not do it because I am rich, I did it because I am human and I know what it means to experience hunger and suffering. The whole idea is to support families that have obeyed the stay at home order. We all know that many families survive from hand to mouth, they feed based on their daily income, so if we are asked to stay at home then the basic which is food, should be provided. It all started when I began to receive support from other people after the declaration of the lockdown. My neighbour gave my son N2, 000 to give me, I called him on the phone to ask him what the money was for. He said it’s a gift to support me because of the kids, I thanked him. A Facebook friend of mine sent me N15, 000 from the USA, another Facebook friend sent me N10, 000. So I began to wonder how people who do not have such opportunities would be able to cope. Then the Mallam that I normally buy yam from, gave me a tuber of yam worth N2000 free. I was so moved to tears. I remember a pregnant woman I saw along the road in the morning that begged me for money to eat, so I put the yam in a bag and gave it to my wife to take to her. After that I asked myself how many other families out there need food like me. So I decided to set up a relief point at CRIMMD my office which I tagged ‘CRIMMD-Covid-19 Stay-at-home Package, to reach out to others who may not be as lucky as we are. So I bought four tubers of yam at N2, 000 each, donated to four families and when I saw the excitement on their faces, I felt encouraged to do more. My motivation was to keep the elderly alive with food so that they don’t become weak and their immune system will give way to other sickness. We need to support others so hunger may not kill us while staying at home.
Who were the beneficiaries of the outreach?
Mostly elderly ones, we drove round our neighbourhood to search for elderly ones who stayed at home, as soon as we sight them in their compounds we went to them and presented them with our little food items. My first outreach got across to four families, the second outing was for 24 families and the third was 32 families and we are still doing the little that we can.
These are trying times for a lot of people, yet you are coming up with something like this, how are you able to fund the outreach?
Through donations from my family and some friends. I also got donations online of up to N66, 000 and I also added to it. People are hungry out there, let me share this with you, I held back tears when we saw a pregnant woman seated with two of her kids by her side, the other two were scooping water from the gutter on the main road. I walked over to her and told her that I liked her son, that he was handsome, she made an attempt to smile but the smile could not manifest. I gave her our package and told her it was for her son, I saw her as she struggled to kneel down to thank me. I caught her half way down and told her not to kneel down. She thanked us and prayed for us, as I walked back into the car, I was sad, that I could not do more for her, I wondered how long my little gift will last for her.
Do you think that the lockdown by the government is the appropriate move, in what ways do you think it will impact lives?
It is the right thing to do, though they even delayed to do it, if Government had taken the right action to lock down from the moment the news broke out, probably we would have had few cases or none. If we stay at home, and we discovered we have the symptoms, we can report ourselves without transferring it to others.
In what ways do you think people can cope with the situation in the country?
Government and good-spirited Nigerians should reach out to the people, So far over N50 billion has been donated by private individuals and corporate organizations, the federal and State governments should supplement and support Nigerians at this point in time with food items, not cooked food and bread like some politicians are doing, give raw foods that can be cooked for families to eat just like most other countries of the world are doing.
