Yakubu Ayana
Alhaji Yakubu Ayana (born September 20, 1959) known as "Darling boy" is a Ghanaian Business man, Philanthropist, Hajj Travel agent and a famed long distance walker whose accomplishments include a two weeks 925-mile expedition from Chicago to New York in the United States to mark the first anniversary of the September 11 attacks at the World Trade Center.
Early life
He was born in Asuoyeboa - Kumasi in the Ashanti Region of Ghana on September 20, 1959. At the age of seven he was sent to his hometown, Tamale in the Northern Region, Ghana to stay with his uncle who was a farmer and an Afa. He commuted between his home and Madrasa everyday and when he was not in the Madrasa he was at the farm with his uncle. He equally assisted one of his uncles who owned a Pharmacy in selling drugs.
His family could not afford to enroll him for western education. At difficult times, young Ayana would move from house-to-house to sing to earn a living. In 1980 and during one of such rounds, he was spotted by a good Samaritan who decided to take him to Nigeria to pursue his singing career.
He saved some money whiles in Nigeria and bought himself a Yamaha RX 100 motorbike. On his way back to Ghana he bought in addition some clothing and shoes and then rode the motorbike from Ibadan in Nigeria to Tamale, where he sold the motorbike and the items he brought along with him to start small scale business.
Later life and career
Ayana was compelled to start his travel agency, Ayana Hajj Agency after his first visit to Mecca and observing the deplorable conditions Ghanaian pilgrims faced in the Holy City. He lamented the flippant travel arrangements made by Ghanaian hajj agents as well as agent leaving pilgrims to their own fate once they complete their role of getting them to the Saudi Arabia. When he returned to Ghana he applied to become a hajj agent and has since been working with the tourism industry. Ayana Hajj Agency registers the highest number of pilgrims every year in the country.
After the second round of Ghana's presidential election in 2000, Alhaji Ayana's house along with his Mercedes - Benz saloon car were burnt to ashes by unidentified persons in Tamale. He was then the Assistant Northern Regional Organizer of the National Democratic Congress. In that fire outbreak, he lost US$70,000 2,800 Pound sterling and 1,700 Saudi riyal, which were paid to him by prospective Hajj pilgrims.
After the incident, Alhaji Ayana decided to travel to the United States of America in 2001 and returned in 2005 to start farming. He is engaged in the cultivation of hundreds of hectors of maize and mango plantations. He is also connected to the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (Ghana), where his outfit buys rice and maize for the Ministry in Northern Ghana. His farming activities attracted the attention of the government of Ghana who have expressed further interest in working with him to create employment for the idle youth of the country by getting them into agriculture.
In 2009, he set up Dolan Ayana Company Limited, a multi-purpose manufacturing company to produce zinc roofing sheets and assemble motorbikes. Located in Tamale the factory serve the three Northern Regions of Ghana as well as Burkina Faso and Togo.
Ayana's reputation came under severe attack in 2011 during the month of the pilgrimage to Mecca. Several newspapers carried stories reporting on dud checks submitted by his Travel agency to the National Hajj Committee that were dishonored by the banks. The checks were an accumulation of payments made by prospective travelers to his travel agency to procure travel documents for them. Ghana News Agency reported that a total of 300 prospective pilgrims who registered with Ayana Travel Agency and have fully paid for visa and other expenses to travel to the Holy Land of Mecca were stranded in Tamale. Alhaji Ayana refuted the allegations stating that only 104 out of 800 intended pilgrims who registered with his agency were advised to stay in Tamale pending when their documents will be ready for their take-off from Accra to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Long distance walking
Alhaji Ayana walked from Tamale to Accra and back to commemorate the swearing-in of former President Jerry John Rawlings in 1993. He embarked on the same walk for the second swearing-in of Rawlings in 1997. The reason for his walks were to celebrate the peaceful swearing-in of a newly democratically-elected President of the Fourth Republic of Ghana and to raise awareness of famine and poverty in Northern Ghana. He also intended to use the attention to raise awareness of the increasing prevalence of cancer in the country.
He embarked on a similar walking exercise to Mecca to perform Hajj. He stated that he was motivated by the fact that people in the days of old had to walked to Mecca to perform the pilgrimage because there were no cars, no bicycles, yet they always reached Mecca on foot to perform the Hajj. From Tamale to Paga, en route to Mecca, passing through Burkina Faso, Mali, Algeria, he was stopped at the Algeria - Libyan border. The border authorizes could not allow him proceed because of the 1986 United States bombing of Libya so he had to finally go by flight.
In 1987 after his return to Ghana, Alhaji Ayana redirected his route through Nigeria to embark on another pilgrimage, but when he got to Sudan he could not proceed because the Second Sudanese Civil War had just started. He had to board a boat to cross the Red Sea, where he was given a ticket to fly to Mecca to perform the Hajj.
In relation to the September 11 attacks, Alhaji Ayana went on a peace walk to preach peace and unity for the whole world, since in his words the incident that took place at the World Trade Center did not only affect Americans. He walked a distance of 925 miles from Chicago to New York in the United States to mark the first anniversary of the September 11 at the World Trade Center. He was reported as saying,
âThis is a walk for world peace because there is a lot of violence in the world.â
He cover the 925-mile expedition to Ground Zero in two weeks. He had support from his co-workers at the Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital enabling him to complete the journey from Chicago through Michigan to Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and finally ended in the hallowed ground where the Twin Towers had stood in New York.
Other distances Alhaji Ayana has covered include Tamale to Accra (400 miles), Accra to Lagos (500 miles), Accra to Algeria (3,000 mile) while he attempted a 5,000-mile journey from Accra to Saudi Arabia.
Philanthropy
Alhaji Ayana is well noted for his charitable efforts to relieve the pains of social problems whiles making attempts to solve those problems at their root.
His company, Dolan-Ayana Farms operating in the Savelugu-Nanton District reserves an annual scholarship package for fifty female students in the district every year. He said in an interview that a lot of young girls of school going age in the area were out of school as a result of poverty, which increases the exodus of young girls from the area down south to engage themselves in the Kayaaye business. He disclosed that plans were far advanced by the company to establish a Vocational school in the area to equip the youth with employable skills.
On October 4, 2008 he presented the keys to a newly built Mosque to the Tamale Teaching Hospital. The mosque was built in a record time of about two months and serves as a place of worship for the workers and patients admitted to the hospital. He said he had plans also to build a mortuary for the hospital, adding that, he had sent a request to the hospital authorities to give him land for the execution of the project. Another mosque was built in Jisonaayili where he resides in Tamale. He makes regular donations to the Nyohini Central Mosque and has provided them with a van to convey their dead to the cemetery.
Among some of his philanthropic activities include annual donations to the Nyohini Children Home in Tamale to help cater for the upkeep of the orphans there.
Alhaji Ayana organizes regular clean-up exercises in hospitals at Tamale and actively campaigns against deforestation by encouraging planting of trees to save the environment.
Personal life
Alhaji Ayana is fluent in at least thirteen languages; both Ghanaian and non-Ghanaian. He speaks all the Official languages of the United Nations except Mandarin and Russian. Notable West African languages he communicates eloquently in include Asante twi, Dagbanli, Fulani, Ga, Hausa, Mfantse, Mossi and Yoruba.
Ayana is actively involved in sports with Racewalking as his favorite.
He has married three times and has eight children, six of whom reside in the United States.
See also
- Zo-Simli-Naa
- Ken Kwaku Addae