For the family of Professor Mike Ike Okwudili, it is still a dream and inconceivable that he had a child somewhere until few weeks ago, a 20-year old young woman came to his house and requested that he should take her to the hospital for a DNA test.
Her name is Blessing.
Having lived with her foster parents who hail from Mbaise in Imo State for 20 years, fate now brought Blessing to Okwudili in a dramatic episode.
Few months ago, thanks to the long strike action embarked by the Academic Staff Union of Universities that forced students to return to their parents, Blessing was tired of staying at home and wanted to learn a skill.
Her choice was sewing. Days after, she went to learn sewing (fashion designing) in a shop that is located about two poles way from theirs.
Fortunately, as destiny has designed, the shop belongs to her biological parents, the Okwudilis, who rented it to her trainer.
While she was in the shop leaning sewing, visitors began to ask her if she was a daughter of the shop owner, Mrs Gloria Okwudili because they resembled.
Mrs Okwudili had her only child 20 years ago at a private hospital, Madonna Infirmary Hospital, owned and operated by one Dr Oguannua, a consultant gynaecologist with the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital UNTH Ituku-Ozalla, Enugu.
In short, she was delivered of a baby boy; on July 2002 after five years, she had difficulty in childbearing. She married to Prof Okwudili in 1997, and when she conceived in 2001 she did not know that she was pregnant for twins. Having been thankful to God that she could conceive, the doctor who managed her, conducted several tests and told her she was pregnant with twins.
Thankful to God that she was going to be a mother, in July 2002 she went to the Infirmary Hospital and was delivered of twins – a boy and a girl, but was given only the baby boy and the daughter was stolen.
The little Blessing was given to one Mrs Chidimma Mariatha Agulanna, a nurse who later worked and retired from the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC). She was said to have connived with Dr Oguannua, the owner of Infirmary Hospital now closed.
It is now 20 years and what was hidden has been unveiled.
Prof Okwudili, a rector of one of the private Polytechnics in Enugu has shops attached to his house somewhere in Thinkers Corner, Enugu.
And this girl Blessing (not her real name) who was a student at the Alex Ekwueme Federal University, Ebonyi, decided to learn sewing to keep herself busy due to the protracted ASUU strike.
That was how she found herself in one of the shops rented out by Prof. Okwudili.
Reports say that neighbours started pointing out resemblance between Blessing and Prof. Okwudili’s wife. Some even confronted her to query that she never told anyone she had a daughter, but she maintained her story.
As stories continued to make the rounds, Blessing herself would reportedly go to the house when she was hungry and demanded for food.
Over time, Mrs Okwudili discovered that the girl had eye problems and decided to take her to an eye clinic.
The doctor was said to have also pointed out the resemblance between the duo. He further noted that the eye problem was exactly the same as that of her son, noting that the prescription for glasses was exactly that of her son.
He advised that Mrs Okwudili probed into the paternity of Blessing.
Meanwhile, it was discovered that her birthday was the same with that of their son, and that her place of birth was the same hospital in Enugu with their son.
Meanwhile, after pressure on the Okwudili family to take her for a DNA test, the results came back with 99.9 per cent positive.
However, the “foster parents” have reported the matter to the police where the case is currently being investigated.
