As the nation celebrates her 61 years of independence from British colonial rule to self governance, a leading patriot, political communications consultant and pioneer Director General of Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), Earl Osaro Onaiwu, has called on the womenfolk to get more involved in active politicking, in order to make their voices heard and also, contribute their quota to improving the democratic system of government in Nigeria.
According the Earl Onaiwu, the patriotic call has become imperative as Nigeria is maturing in self governance and requires all hands on deck in line with global policy initiatives deliberately put in place to encourage and challenge more women to take their seats in politics as they have in the business sectors where they have shattered many glass ceilings which has accentuated their role in helping to shape national economy of many nations. And those accomplishments cannot be ignored in nation-building process.
Earl Onaiwu quoted the literary legend George Orwell who once remarked that, “All issues are political issues”, saying that Nigeria can do with more active participation of women in politics because many of them possess the ideas that can shape, sustain and challenge our democratic experiment to excellent heights. Continuing, he said, womanhood is a community and since the basic principle of democracy is conversation and action, women should contribute more to the conversation that underpins political decision making because democracy diminishes in value when women don’t talk and get involved in it.
According to Onaiwu, democracy rarely rests on ethical sense and has seen women rise through the ranks of political system to the pinnacle. For instance, he said that women like late Margaret Thatcher of Britain, Indira Ghandi of India, Angela Merkel of Germany, Joyce Banda of Malawi, Ellen Hohnson Sirleaf of Liberia and many women in recent years have taken front seats leading their nations and bringing change to into government and public service, which has inspired the younger to excellent foray in public service to assuage practical gender equality agitation.
However, he said that it is encouraging noting that some of our women like Amina Mohammed, the under-Secretary of the United Nations; likes of Dr. Okonjo Iweala and others have taken the global stage and are making a difference in participatory public discuss processes on issues affecting women and society. In this context, said Onaiwu, “I’m fascinated by the notion of encouraging what I want to call pink politics, which simply means getting more women to embrace active politicking which have inherent potentials for national development.”
The political patriot analyzed the political development stages of Nigeria since independence, saying that women votes matter more today than ever because they have a legitimate and forceful voice that speaks to women and inspires action in politics and other areas. He stated that, “this voice is strong and are being heard by the men in decision making positions. Onaiwu specifically observed that politics is sort of stranded without women taking front seats as their male counterpart.
Onaiwu who had recently canvassed the political parties to reserve more positions for women in leadership positions, said the celebration of our 61 years of nationhood is an emergent imperative for Nigerian women to embrace participatory and elective democracy which is the essence of politics. He said politics means talking, and talking empowers. Hence, our own politics ought to expand the narrow spectrum of voices and ideas to encapsulate pink politics because as the world heads more in the direction of digital economy based on political decisions, there’s the need for more women to take active part in the elective process and not merely watch”, he concluded.
I concur to this totally
Women should be allowed to join politics and stop the criticism
Women also have power and every right to be involved in politics