Veteran Nigerian comedian, Atunyota Akpobome, popularly known as Ali Baba, has opened up on how he became a father to triplets at the age of 59.
He mentioned that he and his wife originally planned to have just one more son, having had two daughters.
During a talk on the Leadership Podcast, Ali Baba explained that his wife, Mary Akpobome, really wanted another son, especially since their other children were studying abroad.
They first thought about adopting more kids but later chose to try for a biological child.
This decision led them to In Vitro fertilisation, where they aimed to fertilise two eggs, hoping for at least one successful pregnancy.
The entertainer said:
“Madam had always wanted to have a son. She had two daughters and we talked about it. So, I told her I didn’t want to be having school runs and attending PTA meetings.
One truth is the net becomes empty when all the children have to go abroad to study and the discussion comes up again.
By the way, she had said she wanted to adopt two or three children to take care of them. One day, she then said instead of adopting, let’s just have our own.
I was like ok but the way the economy is and she replied you said the economy is bad, I said yes and she said, ‘have you stopped paying house rent for people?’ I said no. She asked again, ‘Have you stopped paying school fees?’ and I said no.
We have a foundation- the Purple Girl Foundation taking care of over 120 people in schools from primary to university. Beyond that foundation, we have people we are paying school fees for and people we are sending to law school. So, she said all those people you are helping, do you remember the economy?
“She said if you think about it, the reason why God put you in this position might be more than taking care of yourself. So I said okay, let’s do one and she now said if we do one you know that IVFD fails so let’s do two.”
He said he agreed to fertilize two eggs after her request. Interestingly, one of the eggs slit into two thereby giving them three babies. Ali Baba continued:
“So, I said, let’s do two and then one of the eggs slit into two and that was how it became three. When it became three she and the doctor knew that it had become three but they didn’t want to tell me.
So they were like sometimes when we ask God for one million, he gives you two million. When God want to bless you you don’t know how he wants to bless you, he will just do.
So, I was like where is this going to? She said the eggs split into two and I said it was two we were looking for and she said it now three. Then we have three boys.”
