Mr Kunle Adeyanju, the London to Lagos biker and a member of Rotary Club International, on Saturday, said he cheated death about four times during his 41-day travel across 13 countries.
Adeyanju told newsmen in Ilorin on the sidelines of a reception organised for him by the Kwara Rotary Club that the adventure was tortuous and risky.
“Truth is that every kilometre of the 12,000km I covered was fraught with challenges, pains and difficulties.
“Several times I came close to dying. I actually saw death several times. When people say they saw death I never believed that, but when I saw that like four times in Sahara and Mali I now believe that death exists.
“God just wants to keep me alive that is why death did not take me. But one thing I said to myself was that whatever it took I would not quit,” the biker said.
On the motive behind the adventure, he said that “doing this was basically to achieve two purposes of raising awareness of end polio message by seeing how we can see the level of vaccines acceptance. The second objective was to raise funds.
“For me, the two had been accomplished because everybody is now aware of polio. Polio has got a renewed drive as we have the vaccines to end the virus.
“I am very happy that the message has taken a global dimension,” he said.
“I covered a total of 12,000km spanning through 13 countries and 41 cities.
“I left London on April 19 and arrived in Lagos on May 29,” he said.
The President of Presidents of Rotary Clubs in the state, Otunba Rich Oladele, said that the bike rider had done the state and indeed Nigeria proud.
“He has written the name of Nigeria on the global map and in the Guinness Book of Records.
”He is a member of Rotary Club International,” Oladele said.