How a headmaster's advice nearly curtailed the destiny of a poor physically challenged boy

His was purely a matter of showing great sympathy towards that little physically challenged boy he would see daily, crawling in the dirt, just to get to school far away, in search of education.

Considering how difficult it was for him to cope with the regular pattern of life and even more disturbed that he was rather endangering himself, the then headmaster advised the little boy's parents to enroll him in some apprenticeship so as to make him stationary.

Efo Emma believed it was the best thing to do for young Alexander Tetteh, that student of his he would frequently see while standing at the school gate, waving goodbyes or hellos at him as he made his way to school.

"When he completed his elementary year, he was not certified. He urged on. He went to Africa Advance, he was not holding a support. I'll stand at the gate and when he's passing, you'll see him, 'Sir (gestures a wave)', all the time. I feel for him, suffering but he's not perturbed.

"One day, he was coming with his books, I don't know what happened and he fell. Quickly, he woke, patted his dress and then he said, 'Oh, I'm going to come," he explained.

Today, and looking back on the years, Efo Emma gets things better and with tears in his eyes, he narrates how grateful he is to God for not allowing that 'advice'.

"One day, I called him to come over and I asked him why he was worrying himself, struggling for education. 'Your friends learn trade, they are stationed and they work on. Why this struggle?' He just laughed at the side of his mouth but I didn't understand. And then he said he was going to school... and today, I've seen why he did so," Efo Emma explained.

Efo Emma made this known in this week's episode of The Untold on GhanaWeb TV, where we put the spotlight on the physically challenged Alexander Tetteh, the Executive President of the Center for the Employment of Persons with Disabilities.

Mr. Tetteh recalls the challenges he faced as a child, trying to fit in with other children even in the face of glaring rejection mainly due to his usually untidy look.

"I remember at school, and nobody will like to sit by me because when I crawl on the floor - and you can imagine, I crawled in the sand, and I became so dirty, so sweaty, and nobody will sit by me because at the school, there is this mono desk where two people sit but I was alone in my desk.

"And I remember I was so sad that when I came home, I told my mother I won't go to school again because nobody wants to get close to me, nobody wants to play with me and I was very young and wanted to play but my mother encouraged me to go," he narrated.

Watch the show below: