Obasanjo, who was the chairman of the Board of the Murtala Muhammed Foundation, specifically recalled that Women who served as minister in his cabinet were nominated by their states but by his own initiatives, declared that those nine women eventually proved themselves in delivering on their duties and be more reliable in politics.
“When I was elected as president and I asked the states to give me the nominations of people to be appointed as ministers, they did not include women. They just did not include women but fortunately, I had opportunity to set up a retreat composed of men and women who had been with us during the campaign and I was there for one week.
“I saw the performances of all the women that were there. And it was out of those women who were not recommended that I was able to take nine women to be part of my cabinet.
“Women are more reliable in politics than men. I don’t know of experiences in other countries, but here in Nigeria, when you hold your meeting with women and they say good night, it is good night. If it is men and they say good night, they are going for another meeting. And when you ask them, why you went to other meeting, they will say, it is politics. Not staying in one location is politics,” he recalled.
The former president revealed that consequent upon this he faced more intrigues in his eight years in other than he ever witnessed in his entire life put together, declaring that Nigerian men-politicians played their intrigues with impunity and cared less about consequence.
“In my short period in politics, I saw more intrigues more than I have seen in all the rest of my life put together. And they do it with impunity,” he said.
Obasanjo said what was left for Nigerian women to be relevant and play their was not just education but must ensure that they take their place in politics “because we live in a male chauvinism world.”
This was just as he tasked them to ensure that the male folk were part of the drive to achieve the dream rather than relying on only themselves to bring about the change of attitude on the part of men folk.
“I agree that the education of a girl child is important, but we won’t get there until our women take their place in politics because we live in a male chauvinism world. They are your father, brother, husband and cousins. We must have them to do what they should do.
“In this country more than 52 per cent of the population are women and what do we do with that? That is one power you can use; voting power. What do we do with it? Women for women is important but it is not enough. If we rely on women for women, we will not get there. We have to use women for women and use men for women as well.
“Those men are yours. If everything fails, use talk. If everything fails, use pillow talk, pillow argument and pillow persuasion. There is limit to how long they can go without you allowing them. You may even have to go on strike, why not if men will not give us what we must have. They may not give it willingly, we have to extract it from them,” he said.
Besides, Obasanjo canvassed that all cultural, tradition and religious values that were responsible for limiting women influence in decision making must be pulled out of the country’s way of life for women to harness their full potential.
Speaking further, the former president condemned poor representation of women in the National Assembly and other public offices, noting that this was not the situation in countries, including Rwanda, South Africa, among others.
“We have 36 states, we haven’t got a governor who is a woman. The only one that got voted in was judicially removed. Here in Nigeria, we have 360 members in the House of Representatives and only 15 members are women. In Rwanda, 64 per cent of members of their parliament are women. In South Africa, they are 41 per cent.
“Our dream now is women must have their dream place in this country. For any country, it will be unfortunate if 50 per cent; in our own case 52 per cent of our population are not giving what they need to be able to make meaningful contribution to the economic and social life of the country. Then that country will not make the progress that it should make. Beginning is education, acquisition of skill, empowerment and giving women their rightful place from board room; not just in the other room but the board room,” Obasanjo said.
In her own remark, former president of the Republic of Mauritius, Prof. Gurib-Fakim, while speaking on the theme of the event; “Smart Economic: Empowering Women in a Changing World” urged all women to tame timidity and take the necessary risk to enable them to be relevant and play crucial role in their country.
Gurib-Fakim also called for heavy investment in education for a girl-child for growth and development of every country, even as she lamented the attitude of women in disparaging themselves, describing such as a tragedy.
“Women have powers to be advocates of their cause, we must do that for ourselves and the younger generation. women used to desparage other women, that is a tragedy,” she said.
The chief executive officer of Murtala Muhammed Foundation, Mrs. Aisha Muhammed-Oyebode, said women had played key roles in African societies for ages and had equally functioned not only as bearers of life, but also demonstrated tremendous capacity to contribute to the development of every facet of society.
“Yet, their participation in economic development has been peripheral,” she lamented.”
