Kekeli: The young man who walks from Nima to Airport everyday to work

‘When life throws lemons’ at you, are you going to pick them up and turn them into lemonades or will you despair and give in to the challenges.

Well for Kekeli, a Senior High School graduate, irrespective of the challenges that life has presented to him, giving up is not an option.

The mountain may seem unsurmountable but his resolve to break the poverty cycle and cross to the other side of the life remains unshaken.

His determination to succeed at all cost has seen him do about 14km distance each day to and from work.

Ideally, getting a promotion at work means elevation of your status and enhancement of your financial benefits but for Kekeli, the case was different.

His promotion from a regular cleaner to supervisor rather worsened his financial problems.

From Kasoa where he worked and lived with his parents, he was transferred to supervise cleaning services in an apartment in the heart of Ghana’s capital.

Leaving home means Kekeli had to find a new place of accommodation and for someone on a paltry salary, getting a decent place was always going to be difficult.

The only option available to him was a cheaper accommodation at a place with close proximity to his new work place. Luckily for him, with the help of a friend, he got a yet-to-be rented office space at Nima and that’s how he solved his first and perhaps most pressing problem.

The move to Nima opened another door for him with a cleaning job at the Airport Residential area but in that opportunity laid another challenge.

For someone on a low salary, an additional job was a welcoming news but how was he going to juggle the two jobs and also focus on his education.

So Kekeli had to be creative. Not just with how he gets to work but also with expenditures. If you want to achieve something huge, you need to sacrifice in equal proportion and that’s what Kekeli did.

Sacrificing his sleep and comfort for waking up at 2 am he walks to the Airport Residential area to do his first job.

Each morning, while other workers jump on public and private cars to work, he walks almost 7km to execute his job as janitor.

To and fro, Kekeli does almost 14km every day which is physically draining but he is not perturbed.

His eyes remain on the prize and there’s genuine hope that one day this unpleasant experience will make the pages of a successful story of how he never gave up on his dreams.

“Early in the morning like this, sometimes 2 or 3, there’s a company that I clean. Our office is First Atlantic Bank at Airport second so I have to walk and get there early, clean and leave for my second work. My second work is also at Standard Chartered Bank.

“I was transferred from Kasoa with a promotion as a supervisor but then with no accommodation so I had to find my way. I also pay for my NovDec fees. I have been working to pay to fund my school so I can’t be in school fully because if I’m in school I won’t get money.

“My parents are in Kasoa and financially they are not that good. They know I was transferred to this place but the part-time work that I do, they don’t know. I want to keep it as a secret because I don’t want them to be disturbed”, he told Citi TV.