BVPRI Holds Media Roundtable On Political Inclusion For Women, PWDs In Kaduna

By Frederick Peters, KADUNA

NEWSDAILYNIGERIA:  The Basileia Vulnerable People’s Rights Initiatives (BVPRI) has concluded a one-day media roundtable focused on political inclusion for women and persons with disabilities (PWDs) in Kaduna State, culminating in the launch of a new media awareness campaign.

​Held at the Orange Groove Hotel and Suites in Kaduna, the event brought together media executives and practitioners from print, electronic, and online media organizations.

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​In her remarks, BVPRI Founder Mrs. Jennifer Agbaji explained the motivation behind the roundtable. ” This is a media roundtable, and we discovered that the media has a lot of role to play in shaping the perception of people in the society. Having that powerful office, we discovered that they needed to sit around the issues and underreported stories that happen around women’s inclusion. So, BVPRI contacted several communities and stakeholders. Their stories are around: What are the barriers? Why are women not being seen in governance? Why do we still have, like, 5% of women only in Parliament? Why do we have women dropping out at the primary level?”

Agbaji emphasized the need to bring these voices to the forefront through the media:

​”We wanted to find out why. From the stories that people told us, we felt the first people to hear the story is the media. We needed the voices of these women amplified. So, this meeting is a media roundtable to show the media that you have a role to play. These are the issues and barriers that have been identified. How can you use your office to tell stories that can shift, bring a shift, and advance women’s political inclusion?”

​Offering advice to aspiring female politicians, she noted:

​”If you have a passion to run for an election, first of all, what you have to do is to develop yourself, have capacity, you know? I often say this and people laugh, that nobody is going to vote for you because you are a woman or because you have ovaries. People are going to vote for you because you are competent, they have seen what you have done, you have a track record. So if you are someone that is just there, not doing anything to impact society, you are going to have a really tough time. You are even going to have a tough time if you are even with the impact, talking more of no impact.”

​”Leadership is serving people, so start from where you are. Start by building, then sit down with key stakeholders and let them advise you. You don’t know everything by yourself; have all manner of people as advisers so that when you eventually say you want to run, people won’t be looking for ‘what has she done?'”

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Similarly, the Executive Director of BVPRI, Mr. Shinkut Hillary Sheyin, highlighted the critical role of media partnerships in driving the initiative’s goals.

​”We’re here to launch our media campaign for the women’s political inclusion project. Importantly, we know that media is very important to this project because it has to do with a lot of sensitization and awareness creation on the issues and barriers that affect women’s participation in politics. We know that we cannot reach as many people as we can without the media, and the way they package the information is very important for the success of this project.”

​Addressing the challenges faced by women, Sheyin touched upon political dynamics, “We believe that godfatherism has come to take hold in our politics today. However, we’ve also seen a lot of cases where when the people come together, they defeat every form of structure that will inhibit someone’s progress. We’ve seen that recently in elections. So, we believe that although it is something that we cannot throw away, when the people come together, there is nothing more powerful than that. In fact, I see that as the biggest godfather—that’s the people themselves.”

​”We intend that the voices of the people we heard at the community level will be out there, and most especially, we want the media to help sell the stories of these people. Above all, let there be a lot of sensitization and awareness creation so that the perception of people concerning women in politics—particularly the stigmatization—will change, and women will begin to see more support when they’re looking for electoral positions.”

​Describing the outcome of the roundtable as a success, Sheyin added:

​”I see this event as a huge success because of the caliber of people we had in the room, especially the media… They came, and they gave us their commitment that they will sell our story, or the story of the women in the community.”

​Advocating for direct representation, Sheyin concluded:, “When you look at the gender gap in governance, you will see that women constitute a very small fraction of those in electoral positions. And you know, we say that you cannot make policies or make decisions for somebody without that person on the table. So, we have a lot of decisions concerning women made by men… The person who best knows his problem is the person who’s wearing the shoe. So, if women are not on the table, how can the decisions made for them be actually effective? That’s why our focus for this project is on women. We want to see them more not just as advocates or activists, but as decision-makers.”

​Speaking from the perspective of political party leadership, the Chairman of the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) in Kaduna State and YPP State Chairman, Mikyal Abubakar, detailed steps being taken to empower women within party structures., ” In fact, about a month ago, we encouraged women to participate in political parties, to become leaders in the political parties, and to be part of the executives from the ward up to the national level. That will help them anytime they are coming to contest in any position, as they will have a soft landing.”

​Lamenting the current underrepresentation—noting that only one woman currently serves in the Kaduna State House of Assembly—Abubakar expressed optimism for upcoming electoral cycles: “It signifies that the women are not participating well in politics. But looking at the upcoming election, I believe some women have already gotten tickets as candidates to participate in politics. Particularly, let me talk of my own party, where we have a female senatorial candidate from zone one, a female gubernatorial candidate, and three state House of Assembly candidates.”

He also pointed out remaining windows of opportunity within the electoral timetable for substitutions and withdrawals, urging eligible women to step forward as party candidates.

​Addressing cultural and religious perceptions in Northern Nigeria, Abubakar stated:, “Looking at not even Kaduna State, but the entire Northern Nigeria, the cultural and religious aspect is what hinders some women from participating in politics. But their awareness is improving gradually, which we believe we will still take to the local level or to the ward level, so that we can be engaging ourselves with traditional rulers and also religious leaders.”

​”There is no reason why a woman cannot become a leader. If the woman has confidence in herself and her husband also has confidence in her, there is no problem. Looking at Northern Nigeria, we have historical examples like Queen Amina who ruled in the Zaria Emirate.”

​Abubakar concluded with a note on balancing family life and political commitments:

​”The most important is confidence and trust between her and her husband, so there will not be any problem. Late-night political meetings are sometimes what men don’t like. But now, looking at the awareness that is going on, we at the political parties also need to be just to ourselves and adjust the time frame of all political meetings to consider women. At least, for any meeting that takes place, let us wrap it up between 8 PM and 11 PM at the latest so she can go back to her husband, because we don’t want separate marriages.” 

The highpoint of the Roundtable is commitment by the media to step up their contribution to the protection of rights and inclusion for women, the Vulnerable groups among others.