South African are digging deep into their pockets to help a final-year medical student to graduate.
Mumtaaz Emeran, who is known as Tazfitness, on social media took to Instagram to ask for donations towards her school tuition.
In the video she explains that she has just over 24 hours to raise money to pay her outstanding fees or she will not graduate and start working as a medical doctor on January 1.
The video, posted earlier this week, starts with a shy Emeran trying to explain her situation.
“I’m reaching out to you because I’m in a tricky situation.This is a very difficult thing to do for me but I thought, ’let me swallow my pride for second and do it’.
“I just finished my last medical exam and I thought I would be excited and over the moon. But then I got a message from my faculty telling me I will not graduate because of my historical debt and if it’s not settled by December 9, my name will be removed from the graduation list,” said Emeran.
She says the message got to her because she worked really hard to get to her final year of medicine, overcoming many hurdles.
Emeran says in the first three years of her medical studies, she worked while studying to pay her tuition and she even took a gap year to make sure that she could pay her fees.
When she returned to study, she got a sponsor to pay her fees, which was great relief. But, unfortunately, her sponsor could not pay her fees as promised, leaving her with less than 48 hours to raise a lot of money.
Her journey has been an inspirational one, she is originally from the Cape Flats and was a teen mother.
“After I fell pregnant with my son at 16, I decided that I was going to work hard and go study medicine to create a better life for my son. I have worked so hard and done everything I could possibly do to make sure I succeed,’’ said Emeran.
She says graduating is something she wants, not just for herself but for her whole family and needs to see it happen.
Emeran’s comment session has been filled with kind words, motivation and generous donations; she has already reached half of her target.
Watch: