First Nigerian female pilot to fly the Boeing 787 Dreamliner Across the Atlantic, First Officer Adeola Ogunmola talks about her background and how she kept her dream alive with little or no resources.
Wednesday, March 9, 2022
Nigerian parliament rescinds decision on gender equality bills
Nigeria’s lower house of parliament has rescinded its decision on three bills that it discarded at a constitutional amendment session.
The decision, announced by the House of Representatives on Tuesday, was a volte-face on parliament’s March 1 decision to reject the proposed bills. It will now reconsider the bills in a month when it reconvenes for another parliamentary session.
One of the amendments was to grant citizenship to foreign-born husbands of Nigerian women; the Nigerian constitution already confers automatic citizenship on foreign-born wives of Nigerian men. Another would have given a woman the right to become indigenes of their husband’s state after five years of marriage.
The third provision was to assign 35 percent of legislative seats to women, as well as reserve 35 percent of political party leadership, for women.
The parliamentary decision came hours after women protested across three states and the commercial capital of Lagos, on International Women’s Day. It was the second such protest within a week.
“A slap to the face of Nigerian women”
Tuesday morning’s protests, the second in a week, came on the heels of the federal parliament’s rejection of five bills to promote gender equality. The demonstrations were also a call for justice after recent reports of sexual violence and ritual killings targeting women
In Lagos, women had gathered at the government secretariat at Ikeja, the city’s seat of power, singing loudly and chanting multiple grievances against society and government.
‘’It was a march organised to create awareness that women are no longer sitting on the sidelines to demand to be included in government,’’ Stephanie Etiaka, a Lagos-based tech operations manager, told Al Jazeera. “The recent bills that have been turned [down] by the legislative arm of government are a slap to the face of Nigerian women, saying we know that the system is rigged against you and we are not doing anything to create inclusivity.”
Experts and activists have pointed to a lack of women’s participation in government as a factor responsible for the downscaling of women’s rights, as well as a high rate of gender-based violence and economic inequality in Nigeria.
“There is a reason this country is not working,” Kadaria Ahmed, director of Radio Now 95.3 FM, told Al Jazeera at the Lagos protest. ‘’One of them is the lack of female participation. You cannot deny 50 percent of your population the chance to govern themselves to make laws and policies for themselves and expect that the country will make progress.’’
Womanifesto, a coalition of pro-gender equality women organisations in Nigeria, sent a petition to the state and federal parliaments stressing that “women decry this denial and consider [it] a death knell for everything female and for women’s rights.”
The petition demanded the “urgent re-convening, reconsideration and immediate passage of the five women/gender-related bills’’, among other requests.
“Retrogression”
In Lagos, a plot twist ensued after a march to the governor’s office. Politician after politician gave speeches about their lobbying efforts within government to ensure equality. And then the crowd began booing the speakers, mostly male members of the state parliament and a few female politicians.
Ireti Bakare, a member of the Womanifesto group and lead organiser of the Lagos rally, expressed disappointment at what she considered a hijacking of the protest by the political elite, for posturing.
‘’It is ridiculous,’’ she said. “[The protest] has been taken over by Lagos state.”
Protesters on the ground said the change in dynamics highlighted the struggle between civil organisations working towards gender equality and the political class. The protest ended with the civil organisations staging a walkout.
Half of Nigeria’s population is female but women’s representation in politics and government is still very low. Despite years of lobbying and activism, political spaces for women continue to shrink. Female legislators currently make up 4 percent of the legislature, a decrease from 5.8 percent in 2015.
At the rally, public officers including the state commissioner for women affairs called for patience, but those present insisted that they had reached the tipping point.
‘’Nigeria has been independent since 1960 and that is a long time to be patient,” Ahmed said. “What we have seen in the last 10 years is retrogression.”
By Ope Adetayo and Eromo Egbejule
Monday, March 7, 2022
Video - Fourth Batch of Nigerian Evacuees Arrives Nigeria
Another set of Nigerians fleeing the crisis in Ukraine, have been successfully evacuated by the Nigerian Government. The 306 Nigerians arrived at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport this morning bringing the total number of Nigerians returned to the country to 1,149.
Agriculture Remains Backbone of Nigeria's Economy, Says CBN
Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Godwin Emefiele, says agriculture remains a strong pillar and saving grace for the Nigerian economy. Emefiele said this at the weekend while addressing journalists during an inspection tour of a palm plantation at Odighi Village in Ovia North East Local Government Area of Edo State.
The CBN governor expressed satisfaction with the level of interest shown in agriculture and the tremendous impact the sector had had in the last six years. He wondered how the country could have coped with the rising prices of food and commodity items across the world without the foresight to revamp agriculture.
Emefiele said the central bank had assumed a pivotal role in agriculture since 2015, when President Muhammadu Buhari directed that "we produce what we eat and eat what we produce". The apex bank had come up with several initiatives aimed towards repositioning the sector with a view to creating employment opportunities as well as growing the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), he said.
Shortly after the assessment of farm, Emefiele attested to the giant strides already being recorded in the production of maize and cassava and expressed optimism that in the next 12 months, palm produce harvests would have commenced. He acknowledged the significant role played by Edo State Government, under the leadership of Governor Godwin Obaseki, who he said had matched words with action by making sure that arable land was made available to those genuinely interested in agriculture.
He appealed to other state governors to emulate Edo State, which had so far made available about 70 per cent of the promised arable land.
On the socio-economic impact of the CBN interventions, Emefiele mentioned the Anchor Borrowers' Programme (ABP), among other interventions schemes, which revolutionised agricultural practice whereby smallholder farmers, who hitherto could not approach commercial banks for loans. He said the farmers were now being granted credit facilities in the form of inputs, like seedlings, fertiliser, and herbicides.
He said the smallholder farmers could now cultivate and produce enough for their families and sell produce for loan repayment with ease.
Emefiele also commended the efforts of the promoting company, Agri-Allied Resources and Processing Limited and its parent company, Tolaram Limited, for heeding the clarion by the CBN to source their critical raw materials locally. He pointed out that the company had painstakingly embraced backward integration principle by acquiring farmland, measuring about 18,000 hectares, for the cultivation of oil palm, cassava, and maize - the critical raw materials used by the group.
Earlier, Managing Director of Agri-Allaied Resources, Mr. Madhukar Khetan, said the company had so far accessed a 10-year loan in the sum of N15 billion at single-digit interest rate with two-year moratorium, under the Commercial Agricultural Credit Scheme (CACS), for the project.
The farm currently has a workforce of about 1,000.
By James Emejo
‘5G to create deals for digitally inclined Nigerians, firms’
Airtel supports families of Nigerians in Ukraine with free calls
Indications have emerged that businesses and corporations in Nigeria are warming up to leverage the high-speed, capacity and low latency features of the impending Fifth-Generation (5G) network rollout in Nigeria to strike beneficial and useful partnership between their organisations and digitally-inclined Nigerians.
This notion resonated at the weekend at the concluding sessions of the 2022 edition of AfricaNXT conference in Lagos.
Panel discussants from different organisations expressed optimism to drastically reduce unemployment in Nigeria by partnering with willing Internet-compliant Nigerians on various projects ahead of the deployment of 5G being driven by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).
At a panel session titled: Built to Last: Hardcoding Resilience Into the DNA of Your Business, discussants revealed that the organisation created digital work tools and employment opportunities by partnering with result-oriented individuals on various financially rewarding technology projects, products and solutions.
It was also noted that this was a way to retain talents, who wish to leave the organisation but can still be partners delivering results remotely by leveraging the world of possibilities that will be unleashed by extant and next-gen technologies and remunerated for work done. They believe that, these smart contracts will reduce unemployment and ensure continuous socio-economic development in Nigeria.
At another panel session on Disruptive Public Relations in the Imminent Metaverse Era, discussants noted that although not completely developed and fully deployed, the Metaverse (a metaverse is a network of 3D virtual worlds focused on social connection) would allow its users to engage in shared experiences.
Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta, noted that Nigerians should expect a lot of amazing things with the deployment of 5G services in the country, which he said, would positively impact Nigeria’s socio-economic development.
MEANWHILE, Airtel Nigeria has said that customers on its network could now call their loved ones, family members and friends in Ukraine for free and without any conditions attached, noting that it is important to provide unhindered access to everyone who needs to reach out to their loved ones in Ukraine.
Commenting on the initiative, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Airtel Nigeria, Surendran Chemmenkotil, said: “Airtel understands that many Nigerians are anxious about the safety and whereabouts of their friends, family members and loved ones in Ukraine and want to stay connected real time with them.”
By Adeyemi Adepetun
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