At 55, Nollywood actress Olayinka Adebanjo, today, made a heartfelt plea to Nigerians, seeking assistance in her quest to have another child after the devastating loss of her only son, Lateef Adeniyi Adetoun, who died at age 28 and would have been 37 last Monday, January 27, 2027.
Yinka, who appeared on Talk to B was so emotional in her request for assistance from Nigeria as she kept weeping profusely.
Revealing her journey into motherhood that was neither conventional nor planned, Yinka explained that back in 1987, as a young girl preparing for her West African Examinations Council (WAEC), she was swept up in the exuberance of youth.
According to her, like many of her friends in Lagos, she had a boyfriend, who was not smart and would not even touch her, “One day, my friends locked the two of us inside a room with the hope that my boyfriend would touch me but he did not. We did not have sex”, she explalined.
However, it was another young man whom she later discovered was the son of her mother’s friend, who changed her life forever.
According to her, their first intimate encounter resulted in pregnancy, which she kept from her mother but confided in her friended, Kehinde, who accommodated her throughout the time she wrote her WAEC examination.
She noted that the secrecy lasted until she was seven months pregnant adding that it was her mother’s friend who noticed the change in her physique and broke the news to her mother.
She pointed out that her mother took the baby she gave birth to on January 27, 1988 from her and started taking care of him so that she could focus on her acting career.
She stated that 10 years after, her mother died making her son to start living with her and she saw him through school of nursing.
Yinka narrated how her only son died saying while he was playing football, he collapsed on the field and he was rushed to the hospital but he never made it home.
She said, “I lost my son ten years ago,” Yinka recounted with a sorrow that words can barely capture. “When I received the news, I locked myself in my room and wept until I had no more tears. But I had to put on a brave face for those who came to sympathize with me.”
To her, losing Lateef wasn’t just a personal tragedy. It became an emotional wound that society cruelly deepened stating that her friends who once stood by her began to mock her.
She lamented that one of her friends even called her barren, a word that cut through her soul like a dagger resulting to her desperately search for another child, and trying everything within her means to conceive again.
“I have tried everything,” she confessed. “I did IVF, but it didn’t work. I wanted surrogacy, but I don’t have the money. I’ve taken all sorts of medications. I don’t need money—I need a child”, she stated.
Among her attempt of having a child is adoption which was riddled with obstacle as she visited adoption centres, only to be told that she needed connections to have her application approved.
She revealed how strangers took advantage of her kindness as she took in children to care for, but many ended up stealing from her before disappearing into the streets.
She said she is not asking for money but rather a plea for guidance. “I came to this programme because I want people to help me figure out how to have a child. If I have a child without money, I’ll be fine.”
