They were in Abuja to show their dancing prowess
at the National Convention of the All Progressives Congress (APC), but Sunday
morning found them at breakfast table with President Muhammadu Buhari at State
House. No wonder their coordinator said, “this is like a dream, from which I
don’t want to wake.”
Xplicit Dancers are young boys and girls who
engage in vigorous and scintillating dancing to entertain their audiences.
Their performance at Eagle Square on Saturday night earned them an invitation
to breakfast at State House on Sunday, during which President Buhari said: “I
am very impressed with your performance. It must have taken a lot of discipline
and training. To dance with such dexterity is fantastic. I congratulate you.”
The young dancers, aged between 11 and 27 years,
are mostly orphans taken off the streets, and brought up at Explicit Home of
Favour Initiative, Ibadan, Oyo State.
The father of the home is David Abraham, a
graduate of Business Administration. His wife, Oluwakemi, serves as mother, and
they jointly run the registered welfare home. They have two biological children
of their own.
“I still feel this is a dream, and if it is, I
don’t want to wake from it,” Abraham, in his 40s, told the President. “Thanks
sir, for being a father. Because you invited us to have breakfast with you,
came down to our level, stood on the line with us to take your own meal, ate
with us, favour will not depart from you.”
Fourteen members of the dance group were at the
breakfast meeting, though the home currently has an enrolment of 56 people.
They had numbered up to 100 at a certain time, but 45 have graduated, 10 got
married, and are pursuing their professional and domestic lives.
How and when was the home established?
“It was established in 2004. I love to dance,
and I was dancing in church one day, when God told me that dancing is not
enough. I was instructed to take orphans off the streets, and empower them,”
Abraham said.
Explicit Home of Favour Initiative is funded
from takings at dance appearances and freewill contributions.
Onoriede Florentina, Executive Director of the
group, said: “We are short of words. The President is not the way people
describe him on social media. He is humorous, fatherly, and very warm. He sat
with us, ate with us, and it takes a man with a heart of gold to identify with
people like us.” – theyesng.com
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