MONITORING PARTICIPATION OF WOMEN IN POLITICS IN NIGERIA

Background to the Study

Despite the achievements or successes of many Nigerian women, very few have been able to rise to the topmost position of leadership in the political realms. The best and brightest of Nigerian women in politics are mostly back peddled to positions such as Minster of Women Affairs and posts that do not bring out their true potentials. General Babangida (1992) the one time military president in Nigeria, noted in a conference, that “the compelling reasons why women must be integrated in the development process is their numerical strength, they are industrious and enterprising and they are good managers”. Against this backdrop, Admiral Augustus Aikhomu in the regime of Ibrahim Babangida in 1988 indicated the intention of government to set up the Women commission to coordinate women affairs.

In recent times, development has made it possible for women to participate in those activities which were exclusively reserved for the men; however, society still negates them in doing some jobs with the feeling that as weaker beings, they can only be reckoned with after the men. This has greatly affected the participation of women in most developmental programs, politics and administration in particular. Participation of women in politics and administration has been of no significant value yet. Some duties which  concerns development, achievements, decision- making etc are left for men to handle, while lesser jobs like cooking, taking care of the family, typing and teaching are ascribed to women. This has been due to a lot of reasons that will further be explained in this paper.

In Nigeria, recent development has shown that women can perform as much as the male counterpart but society feels reluctant to assign duties of superior positions to women. There remains a large fraction of the women population who are still ignorant and unaware of their rights and the roles they could play in the society; however, attempts made to open up most of the rural areas where women are mostly based have been of tremendous effort. Thus, even women in the villages have become aware of the changes going on around them. To what extent have the Nigerian governments under the 4th Republic encouraged women to come out from their shell and join other women the world over in the full participation in politics and in administration?

1.2 Statement of the Problem

This paper addresses a major challenge women face in politics which allows only a few women rise to a position of power in politics. The major challenge facing women is discrimination from the society, the internal political parties, the communities, our customs, families and religion. Nigerian Politics is seen as a dirty game; therefore, the system paints women who wish to join the game of politics as unladylike because there are activities such as night meetings, violence in politics, corruption, and campaigns that are unladylike. These activities are now customs in politics that are male based. In Nigeria, does the cultural conditioning, ingrained prejudice against women, economic capacity of women, social standing, over powering culture, non- recognition of the skills and indispensable knowledge a women have to offer, work as a barrier to ensure that women do not actively participate in politics? If so, are there laws that punish discrimination and allow for the equal participation of women in Nigeria?

Nations have adopted different approaches but have achieved the same results to ensure that women are equally represented in governance because women make up a major part of the society. Some of the needs of women such as education for the girl child, the ban of early marriage and increasing the age of sexual consent, can best be represented by fellow women. This is why there should be a legal requirement for parties to put a certain proportion of female candidates as members of the legislature and make sure that politics is favorable to all genders. If there is a dearth of women at the country’s highest level of decision making, due to an absence of laws that encourage the participation of women in politics, the growth of the next generation of girls will be deficient, stagnant and pitiable. The right that everyone should be treated equally under the law and no one is above or under the law, to discriminate even from politics.