My father sold his taxi to pay my WAEC fee – Tunde Onakoya

Chess master, Tunde Onakoya, has revealed that his father sold his taxi to pay his West African Examination Council (WAEC) fee.

Onakoya who recently set a new Guinness World Record for the longest chess marathon made this disclosure in a post on his X handle.

“It was an incredibly painful sacrifice because this affected him to a point where he had to leave Lagos and go back to the village to work in a bakery,” Onakoya said.

“He always told us he had no regrets because he wanted us to get the education he never had.”

Onakoya said his dad’s decision to sell his taxi put him under immense pressure to make it in life.

The new chess record-holder said everyone had high hopes that he was going to become a medical doctor and save his family from poverty.

“You can imagine how devastating it was for everyone when I did not gain admission to study medicine despite all the sacrifices my parents made.

“Everything spiralled from there but that’s a story for another day.”

Onakoya last Friday set a new Guinness World Record for the longest chess marathon after playing for 60 hours.

He had initially set himself a target of 58 hours before he decided to add two more hours in Times Square, New York, United States.

Onakoya experienced intense vomiting and stomachache during the challenge but refused to give up.

He has now surpassed the previous Guinness World Record set by Norway’s Hallvard Haug Flatebø and Sjur Ferkingstad.

The two Norwegians set the record of 56 hours, 9 minutes, and 37 seconds for the longest chess marathon in November 2018.

Onakoya is only awaiting the official approval of the Guinness World Record to emerge as the new chess record holder.

To achieve this, Onakoya started playing chess non-stop from 10 am on Wednesday, April 17 to 10 pm on Friday, April 19.

Onakoya set up a program “About Play Chess With Tunde Onakoya” to support the dreams of millions of children globally.

The 29-year-old said the goal of the program is to donate 1 million chess sets globally by 2030, using chess as a simple tool to expand access to education.

To date, they have secured 116,000 chess sets for global distribution, reaching over 25 countries.