For 20-year-old Gift Attah, life once felt peaceful and predictable. Born in Maiduguri, Borno State, she grew up as the eldest of six siblings in a household where “everything was fine, everything was good.” But the sudden rise of the Boko Haram insurgency shattered their sense of safety and forced them to flee. Just as they prepared to escape to Benue State, her father was involved in a severe accident that left him with a broken leg and nearly claimed his life.
“Everything we prepared for, the resources we gathered to move to Benue State, everything was spent on getting him to be okay,” Gift recalls. Her father survived, but the family arrived in Benue with very limited resources.
While her father recovered, survival fell on her mother—and on Gift. At just eight years old, she became a co-caregiver, looking after her younger siblings while her mother hawked buns and sachet water. The move also disrupted her education. Because she called a wristwatch simply a “watch” during her placement test, school administrators pushed her back from primary four to primary one. “It affected my self-esteem. I felt like I didn’t know anything,” she says softly. Yet she adapted, eventually rising to become head girl of her primary school.
Despite the financial constraints, her parents prioritised education, moving from mechanical work to subsistence farming. But when Gift finished secondary school, there was no money for JAMB registration. Watching her peers move on, she felt her story had ended. “I felt like my story had ended,” she admits.
To save money, she hawked buns and egg rolls in local markets. During this time, a mentor named Auntie Anthonia noticed her interest in technology and stood as her guarantor for a Python programming scholarship. Without a laptop, Gift wrote code entirely on paper. “How can you write code on paper and expect results? But looking back, it showed resilience. It taught me determination.”
In 2025, Anthonia encouraged her to register for JAMB, reminding her, “You don’t wait for opportunities; you create opportunities.” Balancing market days with late-night math study, Gift scored 240. Soon after, Anthonia sent her the link to the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program at Pan-Atlantic University (PAU).
Her parents doubted it. “They said, ‘These people are scammers, kidnappers… using you for rituals,’” Gift recalls. But she went anyway. At the interview in Enugu, the PAU team reimbursed her transport immediately, breaking her family’s scepticism. Weeks later, a video call confirmed her selection for the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program. “Congratulations,” came the words. Gift cried with joy. Her mother prostrated in gratitude, while her father refused to believe the news until she arrived on campus.
The scholarship support transformed her reality. To ensure her safe arrival, PAU arranged and covered the cost of her first-ever flight to Lagos. “My dad called me and said, ‘You sure say you enter Aeroplan?’ I said, ‘Yes, it’s an Aeroplan.’ He was so happy,” Gift shares.
At PAU, the girl who once coded on paper received a brand-new laptop and began the bridging programme in preparation for studying Data Science. “From the bridging program and everything, I just felt like, ‘Oh my God, is this me? I don’t want to wake up from this dream.’”
Now Gift stands as a pillar of strength for her family and a beacon of hope for others. Her message is clear: “No matter your struggle, it’s not the end of your story. You can still rise. Don’t quit on yourself. Keep trying, keep believing, keep hoping.”