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NGO Canvasses for Greater Participation of Women in Politics -Global Policy Forum- NGOs NGO Canvasses for Greater Participation of Women in Politics
By Amby Uneze
allAfrica
July 8, 2002
The participation of women in politics in Nigeria needs to be given serious attention, in order to bring true democracy and sustainable development in the country, the executive director of Women Aid Collective (WACOL), a non-governmental organisation, Barr. (Mrs.) Joy Ezeilo has said.
Addressing participants at a three-day national workshop on "Women's Rights and Political Empowe-ment/ Gender Equity" held in Enugu, she observed that the problem of women's lack of political power although caused by several factors was due to sex and gender stereotypes, nature and nurture reinforced by other environmental factors. these she said result to low representation or near absence of women in power and politics.
She maintained that constraints militating against the participation of women in politics and governance should be given much attention by the authorities for the restoration and stability of democracy in the country.
Ezeilo, who is the facilitator of the workshop, said that WACOL was set up to, provide a democratic society free from violence and abuse where human rights of women and children are recognised both in law and practice.
She said that the workshop was designed to look at the plight of women as regards leadership role in the country and how to rectify the constraints for their maximum participation in leadership.
In her key note address, the director-general of National Agency for Food and Drug Administration (NAFDAC), Dr. (Mrs.) Dora Akunyili, tasked women that unless they stood up and take their destiny in their own hands, the status quo would be perpetuated to their collective disadvantage.
"An obvious place to start is on the political scene. It has been demographically established that women are in a clear majority in Nigeria. Given that this is a democratic dispensation, we have it in our power to install all the governments in Nigeria, be they at the local, state or federal levels," Akunyili remarked."
She reminded women that they should deliberately set out to install women-friendly governments everywhere and use them to create an enabling environment for the social, economic and political ascendancy of women.
The NAFDAC boss who was represented at the occasion by the zonal director of South-east, Mrs. Victoria Ezediaro, congratulated WACOL for having the vision and the compelling sense of mission to be in the vanguard of general women empowerment in a society where the subjugation of women is usually not frowned upon.
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