By John Mayaki

For many, Nigeria is a boulevard of broken dreams. Nearly half the citizens are poor, unable to afford the basics. Many of the poor are stricken by various illnesses compounded by late detection and poor treatment.

The government can only do so much amid declining resources and a perennial security challenge that continues to claim more lives and a lion’s share of the available – both earned and borrowed – funds.

So we have a stampede; a bloody chaos for survival. And in stampedes, most lose their humanity. They dull their senses to the cracks of bones and bodies they trudge on, desperate to come out on the other side. They cannot afford to care. But Dion Osagie, the founder and superintendent of Godsent Foundation, a charity NGO operating out of Benin City the Edo State Capital, is cut from a different cloth.

Himself young and contending with the peculiar burdens and anxieties of youth, he has in spite of that selflessly committed himself to the arduous and seemingly impossible task of mending broken dreams, lifting grubby souls, igniting extinguished hopes, and replacing desolation with vitalized ambition and excited anticipation of tomorrow. He throws himself bravely in the deadly Nigerian stampede, evacuating those at the bottom of the pile, and giving them hope anew.

Take for instance the case of Amarachi and her mother, two latest beneficiaries of Dion Osagie’s Godsent Foundation. Young Amarachi grew up with dreamy eyes like most youngsters. She would sharpen her mind in school, acquire the competence required to pursue her passions, build a career out of them and compete with colleagues as equals, leveled by the equalizing power of education. But the nightmares of the present suffocated those dreams.

She had her mother to rely on, but her earnings painfully fell short of taking care of their basic needs let alone fund a grand ambition of a life of quality education and sparkling professionalism. There were both victims of circumstances, confined to a life where little parallels exists between the amount of work put in and the revenue amassed. One where the reward for a full day’s toiling fails to fill the pot, laying bare the insensitivity and silliness of accusations that the poor are simply lazy.

Amarachi, like many others, had to amend her ambitions. There was a will but no way surfaced. Until Dion Osagie heard her story and stepped in, the power of his Godsent Foundation behind him. He quietly set to work, as he often does, and the result was over half a million raised in record time. Amarachi got funds for her fees and other expenses, stipend for a full year, and her mother got a significant chunk to breathe new life into her dying business. Their lives got the Godsent Foundation touch and a new story emerged. A broken dream was fixed; an ambition threatened by seeming insurmountable obstacles survived.

There is also Idaihi Emmanuel, a young boy orphaned at a tender age. When his parents passed suddenly, he was left with dashed hopes and frightening uncertainty on what the future holds. He lives in Upper Sakponba in Benin, an area fraught with crimes committed by youths who have lost their way. Determined to be different, Emmanuel learned to style hair as a barber to earn an income and complement what he got from his guardian aunt. But the buzz and vibration of the clipper isn’t what Emmanuel hoped to conduct for long. He craves education, a fighting chance at the top.

When Dion Osagie learned of his situation, he offered him hope. In addition to a rewarding gig as a barber on weekends, he helped him secure admission into higher institution of learning and awarded to him a starting scholarship of N100,000. A youth saved from a hopeless life of crime – and placed on the path of lifelong empowerment and self-sustenance.

Another widow with three children, all the way from Delta State, could not hide her joy and the tears it summoned when she learned she would now enjoy a weekly stipend, alongside a cash grant to purchase food items, until a substantial amount is available to carry out a full revamp. No longer will she suffer in the sun and rain hawking to feed her children. Her late husband, lost to an awful accident, must have been pleased. She finally met a Godsent in Dion Osagie.

The stories and interventions are simply too many to recount, each carrying a special significance. Hospital bills have been cleared, surgeries sponsored, and humiliating debts settled. Dion Osagie and the Godsent Foundation have a long list of dependents, all of them perfect strangers, who at regular intervals come for cash and food materials.

Through personal example, outstanding transparency, and selfless work, Dion Osagie has built an army of donors scattered across the globe who are doing their bit to make life easier for their compatriots. They made it out of the stampede, or never even took part based on the insulating power of privileged birth, but they will not overlook those still caught in the web. Marshaled by the caring Dion, whose integrity goes ahead of him, they send help, serving as the answers to many people’s prayers for a Godsent. The foundation was aptly named, after all.

It is often said that one man, if he so believes and is willing to put in the work, can change the world. We’ve seen so many examples of them. Men who by their insistence and courage changed the course of history and won freedom and dignity for many others. Dion Osagie has made his entry into the hallowed class. One life and one act of kindness at a time, he has saved many lives from mortal and emotional demise. Because of him, many are alive and truly living. It is exceptional exceptionalism.

Mayaki is a Journalist, Historian, Diplomat, Archivist, Documentalist, Communication, Culture and Media expert (Coventry University, England). He’s also an Oxford and Cambridge University-trained entrepreneurship, leadership and sustainability expert. A Professional Consultant on Communication, Management and Strategy (Chattered Management Institute, England).