Charity is part of the life of Mrs Folasade Oyeniyi, the President of International Women’s Society. She is also an executive of Young Women’s Christian Association of Nigeria. Though she is involved in other charity activities, taking care of female gender is prime to her. In this interview with GBENGA ADERANTI, Oyeniyi explains her passion for charity, place of women in our society and why women should not be treated as a weaker sex. Excerpts:
WHAT is International Women’s Society all about?
IWS is a charity organisation, we are essentially into social services and also focus on female gender.
How have you been helping female gender?
W e run the association through many committees and every member is expected to belong to a committee. We have Committee for Widows, that is because we empower widows, we call it widow’s fund. We have a committee for a day nursery because we have a day nursery in Yaba for children in the nursery school; that has been on for over 50 years. Most of our ex- students are responsible adults in the society. We also run a trolley service at LUTH for patients in the hospital. Every Tuesday, we carry our trolley and give the patients reading materials just a way of helping them to bury their worries and make life easier for them.
We also have a home for found children at Ijebu Ode; we give scholarship to indigent students and deserving girls. Those are the things we do generally. We have been doing these in the last 57 years. We focus on empowering women; we have skill centres where we train women, even men too, to acquire skills that would enable them earn honest living. We train them in catering, in fashion, in decoration, computer, we even do adult literacy.
One would wonder why you are devoting your time to a charity work in this society where majority of the people are individualistic…
It is because whatever thing that you have, it is God that has given it to you and you can never have enough. There is a kind of satisfaction you have because you are impacting other lives. Somebody is comfortable, somebody is laughing, somebody is happy and because I have been able to contribute to this happiness, it gives me a kind of satisfaction. That is why it doesn’t matter what Nigeria is, there are people who are still into charity and they want the charity to be on.
You should also remember that no one is an island, if you want peace, then there should be peace around you. If the people around you, the people you work with, the people you live with, people you commune with, members of your family, if they are not at peace, it is not possible for you to have peace.
If you are very okay, you have more than enough to eat and hunger is not in your dictionary, people around that are hungry will not allow you to enjoy what you think you have. So, it is wise to think about people that are not as privileged as you are; that is why some people deem it fit that when you have a better community and better world, you need to reach out to people and make life better.
Why your interest in girls and women?
Even God is interested in women. Women are like the icing on the human race. When God made man, man was good but He saw that man must not just be like that. God wanted to add beauty to the life of man, God wanted to add perfection to the life of man, God wanted man to be a total human being. So, the female gender was created to complement, to make for the inadequacy, imperfection God has in Himself noticed in man.
So, the IWS or YWCA and other associations I belong to, focus on girls because it is girls that will become women; it is the women that will hold the family; as they say, the man is the head, the woman is the neck, it is the neck that turns the head whichever direction it wants to go. So, it is important to have women that are really good, that can hold their own anywhere; that they are empowered and enlightened. That is why we focus on the girls.
If you are focusing on the girls, you are focusing on the society. They say you train a girl, you train a family, it is an individual you have trained. These are the girls that will become mothers, that will become grandmothers. That is why we have decided to start from girls. In YWCA, we are focusing on the girl-child 11-16, catching them young putting it in their brain what is expected of them as a girl-child. In IWS too, we empower women, we empower widows, we give scholarships to young girls in their schools up to the university level, those who are brilliant but indigent. We also have skill acquisition programme for them. We also train house wives that want to be positively engaged. Some of them are even house girls working with their mistresses, though we also train men but our focus is on women and girls.
In this part of the world, women are regarded as the weaker sex, what do you have to say about this?
It is not only in the African society, all over the world, the impression is that women are weak or may be not intelligent; that men are better than women. It depends on what you are talking about. Women have special skills that are embedded in them. That is the way they are wired, which is different from men. Men have their own strength; they have their own areas of weakness. Women have their own areas of weakness and areas of strength. It is jut a matter of complementing them. Where you are weak, I’m strong, we combine our efforts. However, if you continue to see women as being weak, you haven’t really been able to get the idea of what the life is all about.
Women are not weak, they are only disadvantaged. History seems to favour men more than women. When you see women that are achievers, usually before now, nobody would mention them but it is no longer the same, but now women are doing well. As a man, you have daughters and sons, you send them to the same school. You spend the same money on them, why won’t you expect the kind of result you get from the man from the girl? Women are just human beings of different species from men. That is just it, human being is human being, areas of strength and areas of weakness are different I don’t agree that women are weak.
What are the challenges you face doing this job?
The serious challenge we have is that once you have made up your mind that you want to give to the society, you spend your money, time and energy. So, that is just it, it is just a matter of commitment and dedication, nobody is forcing you to do it and it is not where you are paid for your services but as I told you, the satisfaction is that you are making life comfortable, for somebody will always be there for you.
I noticed that most women in advocacy spot this type of hair style, is it a form of protest or campaign?
No, we are not protesting, what is the protest about? It has nothing to do with protest. It is easier to have my head like this, just like you did this morning, you come and you come out, I find it easier and convenient, I’m not protesting.
…and your husband likes it this way?
It is okay, otherwise it won’t be like this.
How do you manage to combine the home front and charity work since both require serious attention?
I’ve told you that once you’re committed to this job, you find a way of doing it, it is when you don’t want to do that you keep giving excuses and people around you know you for what you are. It is just a matter of knowing whatever you need to combine and make success out of it.
How much of support do you get from government?
IWS is an NGO, we don’t get support from government, we get support from corporate bodies and private organisations through donations, through grants. For instance, in IWS, Barcklays has just trained 27 girls and women in our skilled centres; they gave scholarship to them. We have Mobil that is sponsoring students in our vocational school. A few other people do things for us; they give us money and other things but not government.
What was your growing up like?
I was born in Lagos. My parents are from Kwara. I went to Kwara to live with my grandmother until I left home for school. I did my A levels in Kwara. I went to the University of Ibadan. I attended the University of Lagos (UNILAG). I also attended Rivers State University. I have a Master’s degree in Public Administration; I have a diploma in theology, and so many other things I have been able to do. I attended trainings in management and education at home and abroad.
How does your wardrobe look like?
I ‘m a simple ordinary woman on the street, not fashion crazy. I wear what suits and fits me, depending where I go that suits me and suits the occasion.
How would you describe an African woman?
The African woman is the robust woman that is very fashionable and dresses responsibly.
Dress responsibly? How do you describe that?
Responsible dressing means that you don’t expose the private part of your body. Whichever way you dress, as long as places that are not to be seen are covered, that is responsible dressing. You wear trousers, you wear gown, you wear iro and buba, as long as you are not exposing places that are not supposed to be exposed, that is my definition of being responsibly dressed.
How do you unwind?
I’m a very serious Christian, I go church, I attend Christian fellowships and assemblies, that is what I do. I go to meetings. I attend praise and worship. I attend NGO meetings; it is fun attending NGO meetings where you meet other ladies. You socialise, you network, share ideas and you enjoy yourself.
What turns you off in a person?
I don’t like somebody that is dishonest and arrogant.
Culturally, women are supposed to be subservient to men, but the reality of today doesn’t not support that. What is your take on this?
No, men are not superior. I tell people even in the church, the bible does not say that woman should respect a man, it says wife respect your husband. I don’t have to respect you because you are a man except you command respect. You are a man, and so, what do I do about that?
In any relationship between husband and wife, there is no doubt that there is certain measure of respect, there is a certain measure of confidence. In that case, the wife would give the husband certain form of respect; the husband is the head; even in a partnership, there is senior partner there is junior partner. That one has to do with conscious understanding based on agreement between a wife and her husband. The husband is a big brother, even if the husband is a younger person, yet he is the husband, he is the head of the wife.
But I won’t succumb to the point of men being superior. A husband could be superior to his wife not just any man saying he is superior to a woman. Men and women are to complement each other. The respect should be reciprocal. You respect me I respect you, you’re a human being created in the image of God, likewise me too. Men and women created yee them. So you don’t say because I’m a woman then I should be slippers and be stepping on me, that is the difference. For the husband and wife is a different thing entirely, that is an agreement in a relationship based on who you are and who I’m and you know your position.
Nobody tells God he wants to be a woman or man, you are what you are by the grace of God. No man is better than a woman, we will be talking about a man being better than a woman if there had been a research to show that when you put down the brain, it will show that this is the brain of a woman and this is the brain of man. What you put in your brain makes you what you are.
I wish people will stop looking down on women; that is just my approach to it. Because you are a man does not make you a better person than me; what will make you better is the totality of your education and experience.
