Florence Ita Giwa, a woman of substance, has excelled in politics, entrepreneurship, activism, fashion and other areas of human endeavour. She recently added another feather to her cap berthing a reality show for models with a team of seasoned professionals. She spoke with YETUNDE OLADEINDE, about her motivations and memorable moments, among other issues.
WHAT is the secret of your good looks at 70 plus?
To be quite honest, women have to make efforts to age gracefully and beautifully. This means that there are lots of sacrifices to be made. You don’t eat anyhow and you don’t handle yourself roughly. Live a good life, take care of your health and take care of your body.
Again, it has to do with your family genes and background. It also depends on the knowledge of how to take care of yourself. You have to watch your diet. You are what you ingest in your system. You have to be confident and have a settled mind.
Do you visit the gym?
I walk a lot because I do not have time to go to the gym anymore. I just realised that the older I get, the busier I have become. Then, I used to go to the gym a lot and it paid off.
What are the things that you cherish most in life?
My peace of mind and happiness. Also doing good to humanity, service to humanity.
As a Calabar woman, you must love food a lot or what inspired the business?
How dare you come and accuse me of loving food! I am interested in the Chemistry of food, I am a Calabar woman. And the Calabar woman understands this very well. I learnt so much from my mum. Even though she was a busy journalist, she attached a lot of importance to food. She cooked very well and makes me develop interest in food. I love food very much. Even the thought of food for me is very exciting.
But I am not talking about eating volumes but the thought of eating something special. I am also very adventurous with food. I could travel to eat. I am just coming back from Dakar and they have a variety of ‘ijekuje’. One of my attractions to Dakar is food.
What lessons has life taught you?
I think it is resilience.
Tell us about the children you empower and what this means to you?
One of them is now a petroleum engineer, another is a mechanical engineer. I also have one who is now in Lagos waiting for her call up to go and do her national youth service. In the last two years, we have had seven graduations of all my children. We went to Ghana where I had two graduates in the University of Mines and Technology in Takua. That school, you pay in dollars. It is one of the best in the world. And one of the kids was actually elected as President of the International student’s Union in that school. They were surprised that a woman from Nigeria can do that in Ghana.
What drives you to do all this?
My mother made me imbibe the culture of caring for other people. She and Theresa Bowen were the first female journalists in Nigeria. She was a journalist and an activist. She didn’t like the way they were trampling on people’s rights. She actually went in and out of detention three times in her lifetime.
She was a very strong woman. She also tried to develop people around the community at that time. Now, growing up and going to Bakassi to see the number of children opened my eyes to so manythings.
So, if I collect 100 children in a day, I haven’t done anything. I hope that one day Nigeria would be better. I go there regularly to see what I can do. There are 10 geo-political wards in the place and I just pick randomly without knowing their parents. I started like this and it is about 14 years now. When the first set graduated I continued and now became more adventurous. My last two now, one was four months and the other two months when I took them.
My daughter was a bit uncomfortable and she said at this age you cannot be a nursing mother. You see her running around me saying Mummy, Mummy, and I laugh and say to myself, maybe when your eyes open you see that your mummy is not a young girl. They usually want me to do ring a ring, roses and jump around with them. Now, my last babies are just eight years old now. I have 24, 23, and 21.
If a lot of Nigerians are doing what you are doing, don’t you think things would be better?
Exactly. In the creeks, I don’t know about the northern ones, what is causing banditry is because the areas are not developed. Then you have lack of engagement, lack of employment and then poverty. So, the boys got so frustrated that they also stopped the creation of wealth. Normally there should be wealth in the areas because of the aquatic wealth. But then, the militants go out and take it. When they manage to fish, they take it away from them. It is a very difficult area, but I don’t have a choice and it is where I go to vote. I work from there and I try to make it comfortable.
Apart from human development, I have also on my own done certain things. Unfortunately, this country does not care what people are suffering. In fact, to my greatest shock, the first time I started going to Bakassi as a much younger woman, I was shocked to see that Cameroon and Nigeria are fighting over a place that they have not developed, they have not touched. I did the first borehole, did the first Jetty, even tried to build a school and all that. And two countries are fighting. What are you fighting over and people are suffering up till now? If you go and remove a thousand babies, they are procreating every day. If I didn’t bring out those girls they would have been abused.
And there is so much militant activity going on in that area. Even the militants that embraced amnesty have not fully fulfilled the promises of engaging them.
Are you saying your base as a politician is Bakassi?
In Lagos, I am not a politician. I am what you people call celebrity. I don’t do politics here. I cannot quit politics because I have young people that have been with me, that virtually laid down their lives for me to win election. The last election I won, I was the only opposition from the entire South-South of Nigeria. The last one, I defeated PDP in my state. It is not easy for me to quit politics because thereare children, young men that laid down their lives for me to win four elections. And if I am not around, they would be trample upon and my seat is APC.
The 2023 General elections is around the corner, what message do you have for Nigerians?
I think that the PVC is going to solve a lot of problems. And then for me, the number one advice is against using children for violence. I have established an NGO in my place in which I am also trying to engage the young people. Don’t shed blood for anybody. Let them bring their own children to do that. Say no to violence. That again hinders females a lot.
In my state, since I finished in the state executive, no other woman has been able to do this, even in the House of Reps because of poverty and violence.
Let us assess women’s performance at the national level?
It is very unimpressive, which is most unfortunate. Maybe now that this new system of voting has been introduced, the next time around the women may be able to exercise some form of change. But when it now moves on to theselective syndrome, it became impossible. Now, somebody was support you and then they rig the election in your favour. So, the women are unable to make up and the women organisations just sit in air-conditioned offices and talk and talk.
But, I tell them to go out in the street and start working. Go and start endearing yourself to the people. All the young men have conscience. If they see that you are hardworking, you are involved in the community, you don’t just get there and say you belong to this organisation, it won’t help you. Nobody wants to give away power just like that.
The man who is contesting with a woman would work harder than a man contesting with a man. You are going to touch on his ego. What would he tell his wife when he gets home; that a woman defeated him? So, you have to work very hard. That man is facing you like life and death. So, there is no sympathy. Start early.
I have done four elections and I did not lose elections. I go in as two human beings facing each other; not as a woman. I don’t believe in the gender thing. I am also not a feminist. If there is anything like reincarnation, I want to come back as a woman.
I am a politician and I belong to a political party called APC. If over a thousand people went to the convention and voted for one human being who emerged as presidential candidate, so be it. So, that is the person that I am supporting. The person my party is supporting. As Governor Tinubu did well in Lagos, he would do well. They have not started campaigning yet, but in my state, I am working very hard because for once we really struggled for power to go to the minority areas which is where Icome from. A long serving Senator like me won the primary election and he is likely to win.
The election next year is going to be interesting because of the awareness. Many have gone out to register. Nigerians want the country to move forward; they want change. Nigerians want a president that is interested in being president; not just the title. A governor that wants to be a governor, not just because he wants a job or drive a retinue of cars. It is going to be very competitive, very tough.
To be a president is not easy. I have worked with two Presidents at very close range. I worked with Obasanjo for four years. He worked 24/7 to give Nigerians the best.
You are part of a modeling reality show. What motivated you to do this?
I develop children in totality, giving the confidence, poise, behavioral patterns, family values. So, if anybody comes to tell me about any programme that has to do with human development, especially girls. Although I have brought up boys and guys from very decent human beings from the creeks of Bakassi, and there is nowhere that can be worse than the creeks of Bakassi where my children come from.
Right now, they are flower girls in a wedding in Cotonou on Saturday, and I am going to join them on Thursday. My fulfillment in life is not because I won four elections as a politician, house of reps, Constitutional Conference and Senate twice. My fulfillment is helping children that probably would have perished in the creeks that would have become militants, perished on the high seas as fishermen. Or the girls that would have being abused.
In the creeks, there is no activity other than procreation. Once they reach the age of puberty, they impregnate them because there is no life there. At 6pm the fishermen come back and they drink their ogogoro, light is out and then the buildings have no doors. I would have established a home but I think homes breed some miscreants so I said I would bring them into my family and make them family members. And in my family we don’t have any titles.
For instance, my only grandson, Koko’s son, had the option of going with his dad and mum and then I would join them in Dakar. Then the girls had the option to go to Cotonou and my grandson told his mum and dad that he was going with the girls, and today is his birthday. Right now, they are having his birthday in Cotonou with the two young girls.
We also don’t bring up just ordinary people; we make them extraordinary and challenge them. I just bring up these children, give them my name, and give them upbringing. So, if this project is going to engage some of our upcoming women and not just the reputation that models has that they pick them on the street. When my daughter was young and I wanted to make her cry, I would point at Naomi Campbell as her friend. But today, Naomi has gone places, the Oyinbos saw something in her and today she is the biggest international model.
Perhaps, with this project we would be able to produce models at that level, who after being in the House for eight weeks, enjoy grooming, behavior and more. That is why I am supporting anything that has to do with proper human development. It is because they pick them on the streets that they just give them small money and we hope to change that. It is not just the pageantry; there is a life after the pageantry.