An exemplary podcast about the hidden history of a Nigerian father ★★★★★

‘Before I die, I want to tell the truth. You deserve that.’ When Francis Njotea wakes up from a coma, he reveals that he is eleven years older than his three sons and his ex-wife thought. The Nigerian who emigrated to Belgium was not born in 1954, but in 1943.

Francis teeters on the brink of death. If he does manage to recover, his son Raf (Nigerian father, Flemish mother) wants to know the bottom line. His father waves it away. No, he is from 1954 and does not remember anything about the outpouring in the hospital.

That confusion is the starting point of the excellent five-part podcast parent† Screenwriter, presenter and opinion maker Raf Njotea realizes that he knows very little about his father. Why did Francis come to Belgium in the 1970s? Why did he never have a serious job when he would have studied economics? Why was his father always an outsider in his own family?

Together with bosom friend Lander Kennis, Raf Njotea tries to reconstruct the life story of his father. Francis is also working on this himself, but Raf does not believe everything he is told. Indeed, it is often a contradictory argument. Francis’ personal files with the migration services only raise more mysteries.

And what about the consignment note they find at home about the delivery of a gigantic consignment of fish? Or from the correspondence with countless Flemish women? The key to Francis’s life is given by one of them. More than 45 years ago Vera had a relationship with Francis. She tells how adventurous, well-read and ambitious he was at the time. About what he experienced as a 15-year-old during the Biafra War (1967-1970), the horrific civil war in Nigeria. Later Francis talks about it himself, for the first time.

Gradually, Raf gradually gains more understanding for his father. And compassion: he realizes how hard Francis’s life must have been. How sky-high his family’s expectations are in Nigeria. Meanwhile, Francis’ health is declining; the family is already preparing for the funeral.

parent is an exemplary podcast; personal, sometimes emotional without getting sentimental. Francis’ hidden history is a model for the unknown story of so many migrants who came to Europe – and who made it here or not. Hopefully Raf Njotea and Lander Kennis can one day make a sequel in Nigeria.