Why Nigeria May Never Have Female President

In 1992, the first female presidential aspirant, Mrs Sarah Jibril declared her intention to contest the presidential nomination of the Social Democratic Party. Unfortunately, no single woman among the delegates voted for their fellow woman and Mrs Jibril lost.

Again in 1998, Mrs Jibril, a UK and US-trained Counselling Psychologist contested for the number one office on the platform of PDP, but lost the nomination to Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. Just like in 1992, no single woman among the party’s delegates voted for their fellow woman.

The most amazing one was the 2011 election in which Mrs Sarah Jubril contested against Goodluck Jonathan for the ticket. And as usual, she lost as no single woman among the party’s delegates voted her.

For the fourth time, in 2015, Mrs Jubril, the only female PDP presidential aspirant, failed nomination. It might interest to note that, of the more than 5,000 delegates including several women that thronged the Eagles Square, venue of the exercise, Sarah scored only one vote, which was her own vote.

And reacting to her failure in an interview with newsmen, Mrs Sarah Jibril said, “My loss at the primaries would continue to haunt the women folk in the country for a long time to come.”

And many years after, it appears the prayer of Mrs Jibril is still hunting the conscience of Nigerian women till today.

This year, again, another woman, Mrs Olivia Diana from Imo State emerged the only PDP female presidential aspirant.

She coughed out a whopping N6 million for both the expression of interest and presidential nomination form at a subsidized rate of N1 million. But no single woman among the delegates voted her at the PDP convention held yesterday in Abuja.

See also  Three suspected rtualists arrested with hman parts inside calabashes in PH, Rivers State

Before now, there was Prof. Remi Shonaiya of the KOWA Party, the second woman in the history of Nigeria to offer her services in the presidential election, but again, her candidacy proved to be a joke. No single woman among the delegates voted their own.

Shonaiya like other female aspirants never had the support of their fellow women even though the same women will continue to complain at every women’s meeting about being marginalized by men over the years, crying for unrealistic 35 per cent affirmative action.

As it is today, the number of female candidates in the two major political parties for 2023 general elections has dropped. The implication of this is that, many female State and National Assembly members, will not return to their offices which have now been hijacked by men.

It is not enough for women to wait to be appointed Minister or Commissioner, PA to SA or SA to SSA. I believe women will be setting a bad precedence if all Nigerian women with their highest population, join forces and decide to vote only for themselves instead of the men.

Until then, men will continue to use Nigeria women during campaigns and dump them after election with flimsy excuses that women should be on the bed and in the kitchen.

Most insulting is the political chants “women, dey here? Women, e fine? Any complain?” And the women innocently chorus “no complain”. Thereafter, they will drop peanuts for women to share. And if any woman dare challenge them that all is not well, they will label such a woman “husband snatcher” “prostitute” “widow who killed her husband”.

See also  NDDC: Akpabio Told To Explain How He Used ₦800bn

© Harrison Essien

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*