‘Grassroots women need to be sensitised’
What is your take on and women work?I am a clergy but I have to work because the Bible says if you don’t work, you don’t eat. So I have to do business to support the work of God and be able to impact lives. I have always told women that they need to have […]
What is your take on and women work?
I am a clergy but I have to work because the Bible says if you don’t work, you don’t eat. So I have to do business to support the work of God and be able to impact lives. I have always told women that they need to have something doing. So I will always enjoin them to work and have a source of livelihood. Some men hinder their wives from working or achieving their full potentials with the fear that they will neglect the care of the children and the home. But is not true. They can still work and train their children properly.
What inspired you to form the organization?
It is an inspiration from God and also the environment, environment in the sense when you walk around even if you close your eyes you will see people that are less privileged around us . And if you have the spirit of God, you will have compassion on the needy, and those suffering in silence or ignorance with no one to help or enlighten them.
These days you go to some places and find people living well and who have erected high fences around themselves. They are on their own, they don’t care what is happening to their next door neighbour. Such people like that can’t assist anyone. They don’t care whether their next door neighbour is hungry or not. That kind of attitude is not helpful and you will be able to impact lives.
There are people who are ignorant and need enlightenment. There are women, orphans, widows, people in need around us, some of them it is written all over them that is part of what inspired me.
The organization is not owned by one person but was founded in April 2011 by people of like minds. Firstly, to remove ignorance. Ignorance in quote not only physical ignorance but spiritual ignorance because anybody that is not of God is working in darkeness.
Secondly to enlighten people who don’t know their rights and empower those in need whether with information, materials, cash and especially on vocational skills acquisition. We go to rural areas to talk to people and empower them. We offer free medical intervention to rural dwellers. We go with doctors or medical teams for our outreaches. We also give start-up capital for people who have acquired skills but have no money to start their businesses. We also give scholarship to indigent students.
How do you think poor women in the rural areas can be economically empowered?
Women in rural areas need to be sensitized. When you go to some of these rural areas you see young ladies with babies, outside wedlock, a man may just give them recharge card of 200 naira and have carnal knowledge of them.
Majority of women in rural areas don’t know what they can do. They just believe to marry and when married their husbands carry all the responsibility while they do nothing. They think all they can do is marry, have children and depend on their husbands. So firstly that ignorance has to be taken away from them.
Some of them drop out of school and when they marry and start having children they don’t go back to school again. Marriage does not mean you can’t go further in your education.
Also they have this fear of the unknown, like if I go out to do something what will my husband do, so we have to change their mindset that they have their own rights and that they can actually move out.
They need to be encouraged that they are equally human beings like their husbands and have the right to contribute their own quota to the upkeep of their family.
Grassroots women are more than those in the cities or towns so it is wise to empower them in groups. The women can be sensitized on various aspects that can improve their lives. Then make efforts to talk to them, like the ones we have been meeting, you talk to them and then know their needs. The ones who want to go to school and don’t have the means, support them, those who need vocational skills , help them acquire them so they can have a source of livelihood.
Those people who are farmers and need knowledge and inputs to improve on it should be assisted to to boost their income. They can be enlightened on subsidies, loans and other benefits they can get from the ministry of agric or other organizations.
Government cannot reach everywhere so we work together with them to implement programmes at the grassroots. We are recognized by the ministry of Women Affairs, health, youth, national planning among others.
You recently organized a grassroots women empowerment conference.
Yes people came from different local governments in the country. By gathering them together we were able to tell them how to start their own business. We also ask them to bring proposals of what they want to do so that through the government they can assess loans and then we follow them up. And those in need of materials we gave to them too.
What is your take on girl-child education?
I think this is one of the major problems in the country. Some people believe till date that girls shouldn’t be trained in schools because when they marry they take all the gains to their husband’s house. But the fact is that when you train a woman you train that particular community. Look at the Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo Iweala , and the former DG of NAFDAC, Dora Akunyili, if they are the only ones from their villages, those villages can no longer be ignorant again. It is education that made them to record their achievements. Also look at the former Minister of Education, Ruqayyatu Rufai , during her tenure many things changed for the better for education in this country.
So girl-child education is very important and it is an area government should make more efforts. For instance they can make education compulsory and free from kindergarten level.
More so if you are wealthy and people around you are poor, please help send their children to school and support them.
As a mother what gives you concern about the family unit today and how do you think it can be tackled?
These days there is moral decadence. Not just in Nigeria but everywhere. It is said that charity begins at home. And if moral values are not impacted early in a child before he or she becomes a teenager, it is always very difficult.
Apart from praying for our children, parents should spare time and be close to their children more than ever before. In those days women and men go to the farm yet they instilled morals in their children.
What is increasing the moral decadence is also the copying of western culture and globalisation. With internet today little children have access to a lot of things, in the olden days you don’t see what you are not supposed to see.
We should also try to imbibe the practice of our fathers in those days in talking to our children. That is making sure that before you sleep you talk or chat with your child. like asking ‘how was your day? What did you learn in school?’ Make them important, tell them your challenges, make them know you and learn from the early stage.
Also impact the fear of God in your children and the members of the family should be united.
Finally women should know that their major project is their husbands and their children. They should make their husbands happy and their homes welcoming because men have a lot to think about. They shouldn’t neglect their children and know that marriage is not just about rearing children.