She squeezes her eyes against the smoking coal, picks a piece of yam and turns it over. This is what Mrs. Cecelia Ogbu, 28, has been doing for about a year now to make ends meet. Beside a shopping complex in Utako, Abuja, she started roasting yam for a living early 2016. But it has not always been this way. Years ago when she was a girl, her father, who was an army medical doctor, died after paying for her Secondary School Certificate Examination (SSCE). That was when her childhood dream of becoming a medical doctor was dealt a major blow. There was no one to follow through with the plan of sponsoring her to the university and so Ogbu got married.
Once she had a shop where she sold drinks. When things didn’t work out as she expected, she began to sell boiled corn. But it was a seasonal trade and she soon became idle when farmers were not harvesting the crop.
So Ogbu decided she needed a substitute for her seasonal trade. She asked her husband to help her search for a busy area where she could start a small business. Soon enough, while on his way back from his work place, he spotted a vacant space before a newly built shopping plaza.
“He told me we needed to meet those in charge of the building and ask if I could use the place,” Ogbu said as she served roasted yam with tomato sauce to a young man wearing a shirt and tie. Fortunately for her, she got the permission she needed to set up the business against the fence of the plaza. “I started by roasting yam, but I began to get more customers when I included porridge beans and rice,” she said.
With a capital of N20, 000, Ogbu started her business. All she had was an iron rod, a car tyre and concrete blocks to support it, and fresh tubers of yam. But today she boasts of a shed with benches and a table where her customers sit and order.
Within the space of an hour, not less than ten customers visit Ogbu’s spot and buy yam as take-away, her roasted plantains, rice or beans. This is how much her business has grown.
Agreed tough times always come, but Ogbu is determined to make a living, particularly after her husband is no longer employed. “When I started I didn’t have customers like I do today. But I believed in God. During the weekends, many workers rest at home and it really gets tough,” she explained. “My worst time in this business was in January when people travelled. I began to wonder if I should quit or continue. But I persevered.”
When Ogbu makes a profit of N1000 in a day she’s usually happy. But times are hard, she confessed. “The yam I used to buy before at N10, 000 now costs N25, 000,” she said.
Most of Ogbu’s customers are working class people around Utako who need a less expensive place they can have lunch. With N100, customers can buy a piece of roasted plantain with sauce or two pieces for N150.
Sometime in the afternoon, Ogbu’s younger sister, who’s in secondary school, comes over to give her a hand. Together they work yam over hot coal and serve customers. There’s always Kunu, one of northern Nigeria’s popular local drinks, or soft drinks for those who patronise the joint. But Mrs. Ogbu hasn’t given up on her dream despite the gradual growth of her business. She bids her time and soon, when her three kids, aged five, seven and ten, get to secondary school, she will make her way to the university to study medicine.
