A Monarch’s Mission: How Oba Adédòkun Abolarin’s Free Education Vision is Rewriting the Future of Nigeria’s Poor

RYNI Media: By Omotayo Stephen . O
18 July 2025

In the quiet hills of Oke-Ila Orangun in Osun State, a rare renaissance is unfolding—not in gold-lined palaces or high government chambers, but within the simple walls of a rural school founded by a king with a vision larger than his crown.

Oba Adédòkun Abolarin, the revered Orangun of Oke-Ila, is shattering the age-old image of monarchy as ornamental, replacing splendor with purpose. His brainchild, Abolarin College, is a tuition-free boarding school that educates Nigeria’s brilliant but impoverished children—orphans, street hawkers, and children from households where schooling is a distant dream.

These are not ordinary students—they are handpicked for their intellectual promise and leadership potential, despite their economic disadvantage. And here, they are not only given access to quality education, but also fed, clothed, housed, and mentored—completely free of charge.

“Royalty must serve, or it has no meaning,” says Oba Abolarin, a trained lawyer and former law lecturer at Nigerian universities. He doesn’t just fund the school—he teaches, counsels, and walks the school grounds daily. In a society where public schools are underfunded and UNESCO estimates over 10 million Nigerian children are out of school, his hands-on model is revolutionary.

Students at Abolarin College receive a well-rounded education: academics, ethics, leadership, and cultural literacy. They’re trained to become not just employable graduates, but nation builders. Graduates have gone on to win scholarships, gain university admission, and return to uplift their own communities—a ripple effect of transformation.

Remarkably, the king refuses school fees or donations from families. The institution runs on his personal income, occasional contributions from well-wishers, and the enduring belief that every gifted child deserves a fair shot at greatness—regardless of their background.

Many of the children come from families living under the international poverty line, yet their performances defy their circumstances. Abolarin College has become a model for merit-based educational equity, praised by NGOs and featured in educational policy forums.

In a nation grappling with poverty, broken infrastructure, and failing leadership, Oba Abolarin is quietly demonstrating what transformative governance looks like—not through decrees, but through daily sacrifice.

He’s not just teaching history—he’s making it. One brilliant, underprivileged child at a time.

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