By Oreva Godwin
When I talk about how parents exploit their children, I write with a heavy heart. But I do not write from a shared personal experience.
I come from a loving home, raised by enlightened parents who understood that it was their responsibility to take care of us emotionally, physically, and financially. That’s why it’s heartbreaking to see how some parents today have reversed roles with their children, forcing them to become the breadwinners while they act like dependants.
As the founder of Ima Teens Empowerment Foundation, I started this initiative to tackle issues like this. Yes, child exploitation by parents has existed for a long time, but today, it has become a pandemic.
In one of our sessions with teenagers, I told them plainly: “It’s not your responsibility to provide for your family. Your parents brought you into this world. You are their responsibility. Never sell your body or turn to crime just to roof your father’s house or pay the rent. That burden was never meant for you.”
Frankly, I have never seen a group of people as entitled as some Africans, particularly in Nigeria. The level of expectation parents place on their children is scary. Some parents go as far as having children solely because they failed at creating wealth for themselves and now see those children as their last hope.
How can any parent push a teenage daughter to date fraudsters “Yahoo boys” just to bring in money? How can a parent feel comfortable knowing a 15-year-old is buying them gifts, footing bills, and brandishing the latest iPhone? It is appalling.
Some parents see their daughters talking to older men and simply smile and pass by. Others proudly announce that their teenage sons are engaged in fraudulent activities. Children who should be in school are now building houses for their parents, and instead of being alarmed, these parents rejoice.
Let me sound this loud and clear: being fertile doesn’t qualify you to be a parent. Parenthood is not for everyone.
Many parents are a disgrace to what parenthood should represent. When I was in the university, I became acquainted with a girl named Idara. I noticed she was into “coded runs,” a form of transactional relationships, and one day while we were together, her father called demanding for money.
Furious, she opened up to me. Her story shocked me to my bone marrow and made me all the more grateful for my upbringing.
Idara was born with a silver spoon. Her father owned a tech company in Lagos and was doing well, until greed took over. He invested in a Ponzi scheme on a friend’s recommendation and made good returns. Encouraged by success, he took out a bigger loan, using both his company and their house as collateral. The investment failed. They lost everything and were driven out of their home.
They relocated to the village. Idara was only eight at the time. Her mother began hawking on the streets while the children helped after school. Her father, too proud to work for anyone because he had a PhD, stayed at home doing nothing. Eventually, her mother collapsed on the street and died of a heart attack when Idara was just 13.
By 16, she began dating married men to support her siblings. One day, her father caught her hugging a man. She was terrified, but he simply walked past. Later that day, he called his four daughters and said, “How can I have such beautiful daughters and still be poor? You are my wealth. Be like other girls and bring home the money.”
That statement sealed Idara’s path. She felt like she had no choice. She had to survive and help her family. She started dating wealthy men. The same father who once had a tech empire is now a leach. He later demaned money so he could pay the bride price for the woman he wanted to marry. I was speechless.
Efe was another victim. He dropped out of secondary school with his parents’ full support not to learn a trade, but to learn cybercrime (“Yahoo Yahoo”). He had always dreamt of becoming a medical doctor, but the poverty in his home was overwhelming. His father constantly compared him to other boys who were already “breadwinners.”
He left home to learn cyber crime. Eventually, he made his first 10 million naira. He returned home, roofed the family house, bought household items, and made his parents proud for the first time in his life. Their pride in his crime fueled him. He abandoned his dreams and became committed fully to fraud because his entire family depended on him.
Ada came from a family of eight. Her beauty was undeniable, and her parents saw it as a financial opportunity. At just 17, they called her and said: “You’re the first born. It’s your responsibility to take us out of poverty and train your younger ones. However you do it, just bring home money.”
She was a minor, but men didn’t care. Her parents’ words pushed her into a life of transactional sex. By 19, she was pregnant. Her mother took her for an abortion.
With her earnings, she trained her siblings through university, took her family out of poverty, and became their pride at a cost.
At 38, Ada was still unmarried. She watched all her younger ones get married. She was stigmatized in her community as someone who “sells her body.” But she accepted it. In her mind, she had done her duty.
It wasn’t until she attended her youngest sibling’s wedding that the pain truly hit. At a family meeting, one of her sisters openly said, “I don’t feel comfortable sending my daughter to your house for the holidays. I don’t want her learning your kind of lifestyle.”
Even worse, no one rebuked the statement, not her parents, not her other siblings. That day, Ada realized just how ungrateful her family was.
She reminded them all that her sacrifices pulled them out of poverty, but one of her sisters fired back: “We didn’t force you. There were other ways to make money. We too were ashamed of having a sister who sells her body.” Ada left the meeting devastated. After 21 years of sacrificing everything, she felt discarded like trash.
It is a shame when parents exploit their children. In Nigeria, we often hear things like: “Marry early, so you won’t be doing school runs at old age.” But I say: Don’t have children unless you are financially and emotionally prepared.
This mindset of rushing into marriage and procreation, even when you can barely feed yourself, has created a generation of exploited children, many of whom are now criminals, sex workers, or emotionally damaged.
Even if parents don’t directly ask their children to sell their bodies or commit fraud, life and their expectations can push them into it.
Not everyone is meant to be a parent. Let’s stop being a disgrace to parenthood. Your children are not your escape from poverty.
*The Southerner
REDEFINED
Friday, August 1, 2025
