Three children have been abandoned by their father in a boarding school in Abule-Iroko in the Ado-Odo Ota Local Government Area of Ogun State for seven years.

The children, Seun Adepegba, 14, Seyi, 10 and Titilola, 13 were enrolled by their father, Mr Segun Adepegba at the Solid Model College in 2007, According to the reports.

According to the proprietor of the school, Mr Samuel Ayegbusi, the father who enrolled them on September 24, 2007, claimed to have just separated from their mother and could not afford to take care of them.

He also promised to check on them from time to time.

“Mr Adepegba had pleaded with me to accept them in the boarding school. Mr Adepegba’s sister promised to bear the cost of their upkeep. They paid an initial N150, 000 for the three children for the first term,” he said.

However, their father did not keep his end of the deal as after the first term he did not show up to take his children home for holiday and efforts to reach him proved abortive.

The proprietor said: “Whenever we called him and he realised who was talking on the phone, he would switch off his phones and for the next two weeks, the numbers would not be available. When the school contacted their father’s sisters, we were told that they had travelled out of the country.

“When we called one of them, we were told that they had sent money to Mr Adepegba to defray the children’s school fees and upkeep. But Mr. Adepegba has never come here to make any payment since the initial deposit he made in 2007.”

He explained that the school had expended over N7m on the upkeep of the children since 2007 and taking care of them had become cumbersome as one of them, Titilayo, had started misbehaving and had run away from the hostel twice on the excuse that she was going to look for her father.

Recounting their ordeal, the children who have been severed from parental love and care since infanthood and longing to meet their parents said, the absence of their parents was affecting their studies.

Titilayo said, “We do not know who our mother is. We grew up in Yaba, Lagos and all we remember is that there was a woman that washed our clothes and took care of us until we came here. We knew she was not our mother.”

Seyi, the youngest of them all, who disclosed that her dream was to become a medical doctor said, “Although I have a faint memory of my father, I will like to see him. If he comes today, I will ask him why he left us for so long.”

Seun added, “I don’t care how long he has left us. I just want to see him. I really need to see him.”