Women form a crucial chunk of Nigeria`s population. This is even before one takes into consideration the critical contributions, they make towards fashioning a better society. From the academia to the economy to the public and private sectors, women have shown that they have the guts to grind out a more equal country. They continue to show every day.
Unfortunately, women could do more and be more, but they are simply not allowed by the way the Nigerian society is set up. Patriarchy is deeply entrenched and the fact that it holds firm in spite of overwhelming evidence pointing to its pitfalls bespeaks a country that is unwilling to change its ways.
In politics especially, women are underwhelmingly represented and considered for public offices. This is in spite of the crucial roles they play during elections especially as they appear more willing to participate than their male counterparts. Yet, at the end of the day, when the cake is distributed, they are left with crumbs.
A Non Governmental Organisation, Women in Politics Forum, recently filed a suit against the Federal Government to enforce the National Gender Policy by allotting 35 per cent of appointments in the public sector to women.
In a judgment handed down on April 6,2022, a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja agreed that Nigerian women had been subjected to various forms of discrimination concerning appointments into key positions of government and ordered the enforcement of the National Gender Policy while upholding the 2006 Affirmative Action for Women.
The International Women Day was celebrated on March 8,2022 at about the same time the Federal Executive Council approved a revised National Gender Policy. These came about just as all over the world various legislations were being enacted and policies put in place to uphold affirmative action for women. This is in keeping with the inescapable fact that women have shown many times over that they are a crucial component in the building of better societies.
At a time when countries that are getting the task of nationhood right are practically entrusting their destinies to women, it can only be scandalous that in Nigeria, a witch`s brew of suspicion and superstition continue to shut women out of the corridors of power.
The examples from Nigeria`s public offices are near and nauseating. Women are mostly absent from many of the positions filled via elections and even appointments. Their conspicuous absence from the table where the national cake is shared continues to have far-reaching consequences for their children, families and the society.
Because women do not usually form the core of decision makers at the highest levels of policy making and power sharing, they are always left behind when the decisions that affect them are made. Because women are not empowered to secure and protect themselves in an increasingly insecure country and world, they are most times subjected to heinous acts of horrific violence.
About women, Nigeria has never struggled for policies, legislations and even court decisions. What has always been lacking is the political will to give teeth to these instruments. And until it is acknowledged that there is a link between the exclusion of women from policy making and power-sharing on the one hand, and the horrific injustices women suffer on the other hand and its cataclysmic consequences on the society, women in Nigeria will continue to be treated with kid gloves.
The hope is that Nigeria`s Attorney General, so eager to gazette the decision of the Federal High Court on section 84(12) of the Electoral Act 2022, would be even more eager to implement this decision of the Federal High Court which can be a game changer for Nigerian women and Nigeria as a whole.
Time will tell whether the decision was a win for women and Nigeria, or just another wool pulled over many eyes.
Kene Obiezu,
keneobiezu@gmail.com
