Anambra is heating up again. The Independent National Electoral Commission has fixed November 8, 2025, for the governorship election, but what is stealing the headlines is not the men on the ballot. It is the women—two formidable figures—locked in a quarrel so fierce it seems to confirm a long-whispered idea: that women, more than men, are natural rivals, easily suspicious of one another, and quicker to quarrel over the smallest things. What was once a stereotype muttered in kitchens and compounds is now playing out on the front pages of Nigeria’s newspapers.
For years, social observers have remarked—sometimes unfairly—that while men can quarrel today and sit together over palm wine tomorrow, women tend to turn disagreements into open feuds that spiral into gossip, suspicion, and sometimes bitter enmity. Scholars like Crick and Grotpeter (1995) showed that men usually prefer direct aggression—fists, shouts, or blunt confrontation—while women tilt toward what psychologists call “relational aggression”: subtle digs, character smears, exclusion, and innuendo. This may explain why female quarrels often seem more personal, more cutting, and harder to forget. The home, the office, the market stall, or the tenants’ compound—anywhere two or more women gather—has long been imagined as a stage for rivalry. And now, Anambra politics appears to be offering a case study.
What began as whispers has exploded into an outright war of words between Senator Uche Ekwunife, the APC deputy governorship candidate, and Mrs. Nonye Soludo, wife of the sitting governor. Ironically, they are not direct opponents on the ballot. Yet their exchanges have grown so wild that one newspaper called it “fighting dirty,” while another labeled it “a war between Soludo’s wife and Ekwunife.” Why should this be? Why should Ekwunife, in her campaign to unseat Governor Soludo, fire more shots at his wife than at the professor himself? Why should Nonye, who holds no political office, suddenly find herself in the eye of a political hurricane?
The accusations have been breathtaking. Ekwunife allegedly claimed that Mrs. Soludo once had an affair with the late Governor Mbadinuju and that her children might not even be her husband’s. Nonye, in return, thundered back that she had only ever known one man—her husband—swearing that she married him a virgin and had remained faithful for thirty-three years. She challenged Ekwunife to a public oath of chastity before the Blessed Sacrament, with both families present, and even to a DNA test in London, promising to foot the bill. The drama reads like a Nollywood script, yet it is unfolding in real time before millions of voters.
The irony is striking. While the men—the actual political candidates—maintain relative restraint, the women have taken center stage, clawing at one another with words that cut deeper than daggers. It is this spectacle that makes people nod knowingly at the so-called unwritten rule: that women, by nature or by nurture, are uneasy allies. As Simone de Beauvoir once wrote, “Women do not say to each other: ‘We.’” Instead, she argued, they are often set against one another, defined by rivalry in a world that denies them full solidarity.
Examples abound beyond politics. A university friend once confided she preferred to keep male friends, “because girls come with gossip and endless quarrels.” A man who once lived in a crowded compound recalled warning his wife never to wander into other women’s flats except on special occasions. He had watched women who began as “inseparable friends” end up as bitter enemies, dragging their husbands into wars over cooking pots, buckets of water, or accusations of disrespect. His family remained untouched precisely because they kept a polite distance.
The truth is that suspicion between women is not just anecdote; psychologists suggest it is deeply rooted. Evolutionary theorists like Buss and Shackelford (1997) note that women historically competed with one another not through open combat but through subtle reputation management—gossip, shaming, or social exclusion—which secured resources and protected offspring. In modern life, the same instincts play out in offices, hospitals, and even churches. Many women admit they feel more comfortable with male bosses or doctors, not because men are kinder, but because fellow women can be less forgiving, quicker to slight, and harsher in judgment. Some even prefer “houseboys” to “housegirls” because the household cannot easily survive two self-proclaimed queens.
Politics mirrors this. Women often complain of male dominance, but it is also true that women are not always their own best allies. Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris both fell short against Donald Trump, despite opinion polls and high expectations. Nigerian Idol produced its first female winner only in 2025, a full decade after the show began, though the majority of its audience has always been female. These outcomes, critics argue, reflect not only patriarchal structures but also the quiet reluctance of women to back one another wholeheartedly.
Popular culture has explored this dynamic for decades. Clare Boothe Luce’s 1939 classic The Women portrayed upper-class wives clawing at one another with gossip and betrayal. Mean Girls dramatized the same rivalry in high school corridors, while The Devil Wears Prada painted the office as a battlefield of female ambition and suspicion. Even Little Women, despite its warmth, shows sisters quarrelling bitterly over burnt manuscripts and social slights. As Alcott revealed, love and rivalry are never far apart in female bonds.
To be fair, not all women are quarrelsome, just as not all men are paragons of restraint. Research also shows women generally score higher in emotional intelligence, empathy, and social skills than men. But perhaps that same emotional sensitivity makes them more vulnerable to perceived slights, more reactive to gossip, and more deeply wounded by exclusion. Small breaches—being ignored, overlooked, or disrespected—become triggers for conflicts that appear petty to outsiders but feel existential to those involved.
And so, as Anambra hurtles toward its election, it is not the manifestos or campaign strategies that dominate the conversation but the fiery duel between two women who, officially, are not even political rivals. Their feud, escalating from whispers to oaths of chastity and paternity tests, illustrates with startling clarity why the idea of women as natural rivals has lingered for generations. Whether one sees it as stereotype, satire, or sobering truth, the unfolding drama confirms one thing: in politics as in life, when women fight, the world watches—enthralled, bemused, and unable to look away.
Bagudu can be reached at bagudumohammed15197@gmail.com or on 0703 494 3575.
