…mobilises for NYSC
By Peter Duru, Makurdi
HIS condition does not seem to have any negative impact on him. He feels good and acts like any normal person despite the fact that he is persons with physical disability and cannot move and walk unaided like normal persons.
But this handicap notwithstanding, Peter Gwer, 25, who is confined to a wheelchair and could at best consign himself to a certain location to solicit for alms, is today a proud man armed with a degree in Accounting and preparing to be mobilised for the mandatory National Youth Service Scheme, NYSC, like any other normal Nigerian of that age.
Although deficient in physical strength because of his condition, Peter Gwer is solid in character and learning and can compete effectively with any other physical person for any contest in accounting profession right from his wheel chair.
The reason for his success is clear and unambiguous: He is armed with determination to succeed where people with disabilities fail and he is fixed in making it in life where others crash. With this focus in life and determination to succeed, Gwer does not consider himself as one who is handicapped in any way but strives daily to climb the ladder of success no matter how difficult and challenging it may seem.
He was already on his way to being consigned to stagnation because of his condition but he rejected to be fixated and opted to take his destiny in his hands. He prayed for God’s help to enable him overcome his challenges right from when he completed his secondary education in 2015 and was given N20,000 by his father to start repairing, fixing and charging phones because of his condition.
Gwer immediately moved to Makurdi and rather than take to charging mobile phones, he decided to buy the Joint Admission Matriculation Board form to go to the university. That decision has paid off as he is now a proud holder of a degree in Accounting. “It all started in 2015 shortly after I graduated from Good News Secondary Bassa. My father advised that I should stop further education because of my physical challenge. He also made it clear that he had no money to give me to enable me further my educational. He gave me N20,000 to start a cell phone charging business with the assurance that there was already a power generator and some other tools in the village to help me start the business.
“With the money, I left my village in Nyiev in Guma Local Government Area and joined my brother in Makurdi. But determined to acquire knowledge rather than charging phones for people, I used part of the money to register for JAMB. I also acquired some books and read hard for the examination hoping for heavenly help and intervention to pass the examination. To the glory of God I did very well in the JAMB examination but I lacked the finances to even go near the gate of the university.
“But God sent an angel my way in the form of a woman, and that is Dr. Eunice Ortom, wife of the Benue State governor. It happened during the celebration of the World Disabled Day in Makurdi on December 3, 2016. It was at that event that I met the Benue First Lady. I explained my plight to her and she directed that I should write formally and submit it at the Eunice Spring of Life Foundation, ESLF, office and that when she receives the letter she would take it up from there.
“I wrote as she directed though not still convinced that anything would ever happen because people had offered to assist me in the past but failed. A few months after, the foundation run by the wife of the governor responded to my request and took up the payment of my school fees, accommodation and every other thing I needed to get me into the university. In other words, the Eunice Spring of Life Foundation funded my education in the university from 2016 till I finished school and graduated as an accountant.
“Even after graduating from the university I enrolled for a computer programme and the same foundation funded everything including my present accommodation and all my needs are being taken care of by the foundation. It’s amazing and unbelievable. Today I have been mobilised for the NYSC programme in Edo State. To me, what has happened is dream come true courtesy of the ESLF. It is befitting for me to say that God sent an angel in the form of Dr. Eunice Ortom, whose foundation brought me from grass to grace and changed my story forever.
Reacting to the development, the Programme Manager of ESLF, Tine Agenor said the heart rending story of Peter Gwer is one of the towering success stories of the foundation through its educational intervention that sees lives transformed and uplifted, bestowing new status on its beneficiaries. “On the International Day for Persons with Disability held December 3, 2016, a determined young man named Peter Gwer made a request and he was awarded full scholarship by ESLF to study accounting at the Benue State University Makurdi, on the kind instruction of ESLF’s Founder and First Lady of Benue State, Dr. Eunice Ortom,” Agenor recalled.
“Fast forward to September 2021 when he bagged a BSc in Accounting, a grateful Peter in fact stormed the premises of ESLF, to present to his benefactor and ESLF Founder, Dr. Ortom, his BSc result and other certificates he earned in a bid to acquire computer and digital skills during the same period.
“And October 2021, against all odds, the resilient Peter Gwer made the list of corps members currently mobilised and sworn-in by the NYSC to undergo orientation at the NYSC Orientation Camp, Okada in Edo State. He is an example of a success story despite the challenges facing him,” the programme manager said of Gwer.
