NIGERIA: 'Presidential Affirmative Action Has Brought New Dawn for Our Women'

Source: All Africa
Hajia Zainab Mohammed joined the Ibrahim Idris administration few months to the expiration of his two-term tenure n Kogi State. She is a Senior Special Assistant in charge of Rural Women Development, a position she revels in making women of the state relevant in the social scheme, especially self empowerment. With over 25 years experience in the United Kingdom in her kitty, Hajia Mohammed reveals that time spent in the administration of Governor Idris has exposed her to the ills affecting the Nigerian rural woman. She also tells Special Correspondent Olufemi Yahaya some of the challenges she is faced with since her assumption. Excerpts:

Looking at the last election, would you say there is any hope for the Nigerian woman?

Yes. For the Nigeria women there is hope in the sense that we are just coming up, this a new, a new dawn for the women in Nigeria. They have come a long way; they have done it in their strides and in their various communities. There is now a uniform voice for women, and it is thanks to Her Excellency, the first lady of the federal republic of Nigeria through her Women for Change initiative. Through that medium, she has been advocating, on behalf of all the Nigerian women, the 35 percent affirmative action which the President widely pledged to provide and assist us with.

Would you say it has worked?

I think the awareness creation is really there now, and there is support network for every woman in Nigeria that wants to go in into politics. I know just before the recently concluded election there were lots of capacity building training around political issues around how to carry yourself - if you are a woman. And I think the publicised awareness right from the grass root to the cities was quite great. Unlike before when delving into politics, you faced cultural barrier as a married woman. It is like a man's world and my wife shouldn't be in a man's world. But with the awareness being created with this just concluded election, I think men are more comfortable with it, if I would put it that way. I am hope am right that they are comfortable for their women for going into politics, and well, let watch the stage for the next four years to come to see how many women we have elected into the, Senate, house of Reps, and down to the local government level, perhaps the next four years might produce the governor if not the vice president.

What is your assessment of the present administration led by President Goodluck Jonathan?

The President of Nigeria has made so much promise, and I hope he would keep to the promises. I like his slogan, 'transformation' really, really we are crying out for transformation, the whole country, from the child unborn in Nigeria to the hundred and ten years old man and woman in Nigeria we need the transformation to move forward. Right now, I wish him all he best and all his foot soldiers, the ministers, Special assistants, senators, and the house of Reps would pass the right bill for the right thing to happen to the society. It is one thing to be the leader to say this is really what you want, as a leader, you an administrator you cant go out there and do the work, your ministers, the SAs do the work and we hope that every one around Mr Goodluck would do a good work for Nigeria for a better Nigeria and for the transformation to happen.

With your experience, at the end of your tenure, would you still want to stay in Nigeria or return to Europe?

I'd love to stay back. I think it is time to give back the little I can to my community. Getting to help give them a new direction, change the mind set would mean I have done well. But that is not to say that I am comfortable being here; I am comfortable being back to where I grew up, and at any given opportunity to serve my people I will do it all over again. I hope I will do it better.

So what is your advise to the women?

I believe the time is ripe, and that Kogi women should take the present opportunity to go into active politics. They should not only accept but engender change. They must try and be the change that we all are yearning for. You know it is easy to change things; we all can do it, by accepting that change ourselves.

Nigeria