A group, Women in Politics Forum (WIPF), has attributed the poor participation of women in politics and the political process in Nigeria to the dominance of the political space by their male counterparts.
Speaking at a press conference in Sokoto, the Sokoto State capital recently, its National President Ebere Ifendu solicited the support of the media to change the narratives in favour of the women folk.
Ifendu said statistical surveys suggest that women’s representation in elective positions was discouraging and needed to be reversed. She blamed the lack of internal democracy in party politics, provision of free forms to women and god-fatherism as some of the issues responsible for the poor participation of women as expected.
She said: “Our appeal is to the media to partner with us to drive our mission and vision for the country through inclusive participation. It is no longer news that at the end of the last general elections in 2019, women made up of a total of 4.71 per cent of the elected officials, showing a decline from the 2015 period when women made up 5.6 per cent of the elected officials.”
Ifendu also made reference to the current statistical record of women’s representation ahead of next year’s general elections, going by the list of presidential and National Assembly candidates recently released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). She said of the 18 political parties that fielded presidential candidates and their running mates, only one female, the presidential candidate of the Allied Peoples’ Movement (APM), is captured in the list.
She added: “For the Senate, women have only 8.35 per cent with the House of Representatives having just 9.2 per cent. We are worried by the abysmal percentage of women in both elective and appointive positions in governance, despite incessant advocacies and proposals by civil society organisations, policies and legislations by government and relevant stakeholders.”
Ifendu said the forum has conducted a thorough investigation on the prevailing causes of the poor participation of women in politics and the effectiveness or otherwise of existing interventions.
The group expressed appreciation for the passage of the Electoral Act 2022, which gives INEC the power to deploy technological innovations to ensure that every vote counts to make elections free and fair. But, it said further cooperation is required from the judiciary, the executive, the legislature, the media, security agencies, political parties, as well as religious, traditional and community leaders to strengthen the political space and allow inclusive participation that will reflect the better representation of women.
Public Relations Officer of the Sokoto State chapter, Fatima Khalid also appealed to political parties to ensure that there is a level-playing ground to allow women to showcase their prowess in elective and appointive positions.
She described as unfortunate the fact that committees on women’s affairs in some state assemblies are headed by male legislators, a practice which has further denied women their rightful place in the political arena.