A Mother's Strength

Rachel Okafor sells puff-puff on dusty streets and hauls cement on building sites to keep her daughters Gift and Chinaza in school. Gift slips out to meet a young man who buys her clothes and a wig, and she lies about her whereabouts until Rachel confronts her. Chinaza collapses from a ruptured appendix and the hospital demands 200,000 naira before surgery. Rachel kneels before the doctor, works to exhaustion, and accepts the money Gift raises by selling her iPhone. The daughters overhear a conversation revealing their father Barry is alive and wealthy in Lagos, not dead as she told them. They confront her and she confesses that Barry abandoned them for a rich woman named Vivian and that she declared him dead to protect them. Barry arrives remorseful, promising to take the girls to Lagos, fund their education, and set Rachel up in business. Rachel pleads for them to stay, citing her years of sacrifice, but the girls leave with him. At Barry's home his wife Vivian treats the girls cruelly, denying them food and mocking their poverty. Barry tries to intervene but Vivian threatens divorce and legal ruin if he disobeys her. Realizing the household offers no safety, Chinaza takes money from Barry's bag and flees to their mother with Gift. Rachel initially rejects them in hurt pride, pretending not to know them, but the girls persist through the night begging forgiveness. She finally opens the door and the three embrace in a tearful reconciliation over a simple meal. United again the daughters propose modernizing Rachel's puff-puff trade through social media and secure catering contracts for weddings and birthdays. The business flourishes and they plan to move from their shack into a proper home in Abuja. Meanwhile Barry searches for them at their old address and learns they have relocated to Abuja. He stands alone on a dark road and realizes he has lost his family a second time.