i GENDER SENSITIVITY IN NIGERIAN FEDERAL GOVERNANCE AND THE EFFECTS ON AFFIRMATIVE ACTION SINCE 1999
BY
ANIOKE UCHENNA VIVIAN PG/M.SC/12/64291
DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE FACULTY OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA NSUKKA
AUGUST, 2013
ii GENDER SENSITIVITY IN NIGERIAN FEDERAL GOVERNANCE AND THE EFFECTS ON AFFIRMATIVE ACTION SINCE 1999
BY
ANIOKE UCHENNA VIVIAN PG/M.SC/12/64291
BEING A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENT FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF SCIENCE (M.SC) IN POLITICAL SCIENCE (INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS) UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA, NSUKKA.
DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, FACULTY OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES, UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA, NSUKKA.
SUPERVISOR: PROF. OBASI IGWE
AUGUST, 2013
iii TITLE PAGE
GENDER SENSITIVITY IN NIGERIAN FEDERAL GOVERNANCE AND THE EFFECTS ON AFFIRMATIVE ACTION SINCE 1999
BY
ANIOKE UCHENNA VIVIAN PG/M.SC/12/64291
iv
APPROVAL PAGE
This Dissertation as carried out by Anioke Uchenna Vivian (PG/M.SC/12/64291) of the Department of Political Science, Faculty of the Social Sciences, University of Nigeria Nsukka is hereby approved.
------PROF.OBASI IGWE DATE PROJECT SUPERVISOR
------PROF.JONAH ONUOHA DATE HEAD OF DEPARTMENT
v DEDICATION
This Research Report is dedicated to my lovely parents, DR. AND MRS. S.C ANIOKE for their love and support.
vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The successful completion of this academic work could not have been possible without the grace and help of God Almighty who in his infinite mercies granted me life, strength and good health to pass through the crucial and difficult periods during my academic pursuit. My profound gratitude goes to my amiable and distinguished supervisor, PROF. OBASI IGWE for his fatherly guidance, supports and encouragement. His outstanding, exceptional and professional supervision enabled me to go through a thorough research work. Irrespective of his busy schedules, he was there for me till the completion of this study. Thanks to my head of department PROF.JONAH ONUOHA for a wonderful opportunity. I also appreciate my wonderful lecturers, Prof. Okolie M.A and Prof. Ken Ifesinachi for their intensive academic drillings and guidance during my stay in the institution. My special gratitude and appreciation goes to my darling parents DR. AND MRS. S.C ANIOKE, for their moral and financial encouragements and for their prayers, love, care and understanding during my period of this study. I also thank my lovely sister, brothers and aunties: ENGR. ADAORA, MRS. FIDEL, MRS. ROSEMARY, CHIDINMA, CHIDIEBUBE, CHRISTIAN (C2), AND AUNTY: AGATHA, ASOKA, CECILIA AND MARIA for their wonderful encouragements and supports. My appreciation goes equally to my Pastors- Pastor Nnamdi, Pastor Jevas Opara, Pastor Mike Iduma, and Pastor Christopher Okoro whose thoughtful prayers were pillars of support to me. To all my friends and well wishers, I express my most warmth appreciation. Thank you.
vii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
AA AFFIRMATIVE ACTION
BLP BETTER LIFE PROGRAMME
CEDAW CONVENTION ON THE ELIMINATION OF ALL FORMS OF
DISCRIMINATIONS AGAINST WOMEN
WRAPA WOMEN’S RIGHTS ADVANCEMENT AND PROTECTION ALTERNATIVES
UN UNITED NATION
IPU INTER PARLIAMENTARY UNION
US UNITED STATES
PDP PEOPLE’S DEMOCRATIC PARTY
ERC ELECTORAL REFORM COMMITTEE
UNDP UNITED NATIONS DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME
MDG MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS
NEEDS NIGERIA ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT AND DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY
INEC INDEPENDENT NATIONAL ELECTORAL COMMISSION
UK UNITED KINGDOM
UNESCO UNITED NATIONS EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANIZATION
NPC NIGERIA POPULATION COMMISSION
NBS NATIONAL BUREAU OF STATISTICS
ILO INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANIZATION
GETW GLOBAL EMPLOYMENT TREND FOR WOMEN
viii TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title Page ------i
Approval Page------ii
Dedication ------iii
Acknowledgment ------iv
Lists of Abbreviations ------v
Table of Contents ------vi
List of Tables ------ix
Abstract ------x
Chapter One: Introduction
1.1 Background of the study ------1
1.2 Statement of the problem ------7
1.3 Objectives of the study ------11
1.4 Significance of the study ------15
1.5 Operational definitions ------17
2.0 Chapter Two: Literature Review
The Concept of Gender Sensitivity ------18
The Concept of Affirmative Action ------18
Status of Gender Equality and Situation of Women in Nigeria------19
Levels of Gender Representation in Federal Governance ------22
Factors Militating against active Participation of Women in Nigerian Politics - - - 25
Gender and Internal Party Politics in Nigeria ------31
The Prospects of Electoral Reform for Nigerian Women ------32
Conceptual Issues: Gender Sensitivity, Sustainable Development and the Effects on Affirmative Action ------35
Evaluation of the Goals of Affirmative Action since 1999 ------39 ix Gap in Literature ------45
CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Theoretical Framework------48
Hypotheses ------50
Research Design ------50
Method of Data Collection------51
Method of Data Analysis------52
CHAPTER FOUR
Dimensions of the Debate on Gender and Affirmative Action in Nigeria- - - - - 53
Politics of Affirmative Action------55
Arguments for Affirmative Action------56
Arguments against Affirmative Action------61
Evaluation of Both Sides of Debate on Gender Affirmative Action------64
Application to Nigerian Context------69
CHAPTER FIVE
Effects of Gender on Federal Affirmative Action------70
Status of Women in Pre-colonial Nigeria------70
Status of Women in Colonial Nigeria------74
Status of Women in Post-colonial Nigeria------76
The Effects of Affirmative Action on Gender------77
The Need cum Emergence of Federal Affirmative Action------81
Evaluations of the impacts of Affirmative Action on Gender Equality and Women Representation in Governance------86 x
CHAPTER SIX
Policy Alternative for Women Equality in Nigeria ------100
CHAPTER SEVEN
Summary------108
Conclusion------110
Recommendation------112
Bibliography
xi LIST OF TABLES
Chapter Two:
Table 1: Women in the Nigerian Assemble from 1980 to 1992. 24
Table 2: Levels of Women Representation in Upper and Lower
House from 1999 to 2011. 44
Chapter Five:
Table 1: Statistics of Local Government Chairmen in the 4 th Republic 89
Table 2: Gender Statistics on State Governors and Deputy Governors in the 4 th Republic. 90
Table 3: Gender Statistics of 4 th Republic Presidency 91
Table 4: Gender Desegregated table of Elective Political Positions 1999/2003 in Nigeria 92
Table 5: Gender Desegregated table on Elective Political Positions for 1999/2003 and 2003/2007 92
Table 6: Some Appointments made by the Civilian Government at the Federal and State Levels from May 29 th 1999 to 2003. 93
Table 7: World Classification of Women in National Parliament 94
xii ABSTRACT
Gender Sensitivity in Nigerian Federal Governance and the Effects on Affirmative Action since 1999 is a study set out to unravel how effective gender sensitivity has been in the Nigerian Federal Governance and the impacts of Affirmative Action since 1999. It examines Dimensions of heated Debates on Gender and Affirmative Action, especially as various controversial opinions rages over the introduction of Gender Based Affirmative Action. The study reviewed the major current Federal Affirmative Actions, and advocated for some Policy Alternatives for Women Equality and Progress in Nigeria. The study adopted Feminist Theory in the work. The study also utilized Secondary Source of Data Collection where we made use of books, journals, internet materials and so on. The study relied on Qualitative Research Techniques. This type of techniques is essentially the application of Qualitative Research Method in the thorough Examination and Interpretation of Research Data. We equally made use of One Group: Pre-Test, Post-Test type of Research Design. Our findings revealed that government is yet to commit itself toward redressing the issue of gender imbalances especially in the area of women’s representation in Federal Governance as none of the Federal Affirmative Actions introduced since 1999 has been able to cause any significant positive change. It therefore, concluded that promoting Gender Sensitivity and Affirmative Action in Federal Governance is a Recipe for a Sustainable National Development, National Security and Good Governance. Hence, the study finally recommended that federal government should stringently place Gender Affirmative Action at the fore front of its developmental policies by sincerely committing itself to the formulation and implementation of Gender Affirmative Actions, in order to achieve her set Millennium Development Goals.
1
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background to the Study
According to Arowolo and Abe (2008:13-14), “the essence of political participation in any society, either civilized or primitive is to seek control of power, acquisition of power and dispensing power to organize society, harness and distribute resources and to influence decision making in line with organized or individual interest”. All groups including women seek to influence the dispensation of power in line with their articulated interests as a fundamental motive of political participation. Women, in their gradual consciousness of state of mind also, in recent times, increasingly seek power equation and distribution and redistribution of resources in their favour. Although, careful observations have indicated that the participation of women in Nigerian politics is hugely noticeable at the level of voting and latent support. As noted by Okolie (2004:53), views political participation as “freedom of expression, association, right to free flow of communication; right to influence decision process and the right to social justice, health services, better working conditions and opportunity for franchise”.
Political participation is one of the key ingredients of democracy in its real sense, hence, taking the conceptualization of democracy by Diamond (1989: xvi) into cognizance, “democracy provides the equal opportunity platform for political participation and fairness in such competition, thus; a system of government that meets three essential conditions: meaningful and extensive competition among individuals and groups, especially political parties, for all effective positions of government power, at regular intervals and excluding the use of force; a highly inclusive level of political participation in the selection of leaders and policies, at least through regular and fair election, such that no major(adult) social group is excluded; and a level of civil and political liberties, freedom to form and join organizations sufficient to ensure the integrity of political competition and participation”.
Similarly, Onyeoziri (1989:6) highlighted four domains of democracy which include: “the domain of individual and group rights and freedoms; the domain of popular and equal participation in collective decision; the domain of accountability of government to masses publics and constituent minorities; and the domain of the application of the principle of equal citizenship in all spheres of life-social, economic and political”. 2
In view of this, gender equality promotion is presently accepted globally as a development strategy essential for reducing poverty levels among men and women, improve health and living standards, and also enhance efficiency of public investment. The attainment of gender equality is not only seen as an end in itself and human rights issues, but also a prerequisite for the development of sustainable development.
The plight of Nigerian women, like their counterparts in other parts of developed countries have been characterized by lack of adequate representation, undue domination of men in the socio-political scheme of things; lopsided political appointments and the general imbalances associated with very unjust treatment of the female citizens in its entirety. Therefore, it common place to observe that, the womanhood is reduced to mere infidel and a second-class citizen, hence, there is the commonality of general belief system that the best place for women is the “kitchen”. This trend therefore has brought about tremendous misrepresentation of women right at the level of the family down to the circular society. Thus, the purported irrelevance associated with the status of women in society has merely reduced an average woman to an inferior commodity. The Nigerian woman is therefore, discriminated upon from, in most cases, acquiring formal education, mistreated and perpetually kept as house-help; the average Nigerian woman is seen as an object for prostitution, force marriage, street hawking, instrument of wide-range trafficking, a misfit in the society and these ill perceptions have no option than to deepen the level of marginalization of Nigerian women (Erunke, 2011).
However, the status of women marginalization in Nigeria has varied from time to time and has taken different forms in different societies and historical epochs. In the pre-colonial society, women played vital roles in both social and economic activities. Division of labour was on gender lines. Power and privileges in the family were based on age and gender hence; it allowed elder women to have voice on many matters. That notwithstanding, beyond family level power was generally dominated by the male folk but women were not totally powerless given to the fact that some rose to prestigious chieftaincy title like Iyalode, some also became powerful queens as was obtainable in the Ondo and Daura histories. Women held high political offices like in the rein of Queen Amina of Zaria who conquered all the towns around Zamfara and Nupe, and dominated this region for 34years.Women were given freedom from male’s total domination, although men had upper hand in the system. The colonial era 3 injected a contaminated practice of massive women marginalization in the society through the introduction of “European patriarchatism’’ which indeed shot the door against women freedom and political participation. The system restricted women to child rearing and domestic chores stating that women should be subordinate to men and if allowed to attain financial freedom would ameliorate their respects for their husbands. The colonial state displaced the place of Nigerian women, infusing European patriarchatism into the system which has contributed immensely to the modern (post colonial) huge disparity in gender equality. The effects cum operations of gender inequality transcended to the post colonial era which have been a radical inhibitor to true democracy and sustainable national development. These consequences drew both national and international concern hence; leading to various crucial clamours for gender equality and proper women representation in governance.
According to Irabor (2012), the marginalization of Nigerian women has transcended to politics and decision making level, which is as old as the Nigeria society, and actually predates the advent of colonialism in Southern and Northern Nigeria. After the independence in 1960, Nigeria was seized by military rule for 29 years, which gave very limited space for political participation. The First Republic (1960-1966) was intensively dominated by men likewise the Second Republic (1979-1983) and even the Third Republic, (1992-1993). The First Republic produced just one female senator from then western region by name, Late Chief Wuraola Esan. In 1961, the Late Chief (Mrs.) Margaret Ekpo contested election into Aba Urban North Constituency under the National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) platform and won, thus becoming a member of the Eastern Nigerian House of Assembly until 1966. Mrs. Janet N .Mokelu and Miss Ekpo A.Young equally contested elections, won and became members of the Eastern House of Assembly. In the Northern Nigeria however, women were still denied the opportunity to vote and be voted for even after independence. As a result, prominent female politicians in the area like Late Hajia Gambo Sawaba could not vote and be voted for. It was only in 1979 that women in the Northern Nigerian were given opportunity, following the return to civilian rule.
In his contribution, Yusuf (2009) observed one of the remarkable achievements of the constituent assembly (the 1979 elections) was the adoption of the universal franchise and through it; women in the northern Nigeria were enfranchised and voted in the 1979 elections. 4
The result however, showed that, there was no woman in the 45 member senate, although 4 contested for seats. Three women were elected into the 450 Member House of Representative, and 5 were elected into the various State Houses of Assembly. In terms of appointive positions, 3 Female Ministers were appointed members of the Federal Executive Council. At least, 1 Female Commissioner was appointed in each state. In 1983 election, there were no significant changes in favour of women expect the election of Ms. Franca Afegbua into the 45 member senate. Given the return of the military, the fourth military regime led by general Muhammadu Buhari did not organize an election, but each state continued to have at least one female commissioner, but the coming of General Ibrahim increased visibility of women through the Better Life Programme (BLP) which was the first National Women Empowerment Programme. In the 1990 gubernatorial and local government elections, women won 206 out of the 1,297 positions at the local level nationwide, and in the 1992 National Assembly elections, one woman made it to the 90 member senate as 12 were elected to the 638 Member House of Representatives.
In the post military interim government, the 32 member interim government had only one woman. The Ministry of Women Affairs was created in 1995 and 2 women was appointed ministers. In the 1998 general elections, 3 women became members of the 109 member senate while 12 women were elected to the 360 member House of Representatives. We also had; 9 women out of 44 Ministers/Advisers, 1 woman out of 36 Deputy Governors, 1 woman out of 36 Speakers, and 12 women out of 990 Members of State Houses of Assembly. As these went on, women were hoping for better representation and involvement in politics. Hence, the 2003 election was marked by increasing involvement of women in politics, as more women contested for elective positions more than any other time previously in the country’s history. Given the 2003 election results, the Senate had 3 women, the House of Representative had 21 women, and the Federal Executive council had 6 women out of 34 members, 10 women out of 35 Special Advisers, 2 women out of 36 Deputy Governors and 2 Female-Speakers. The 2007 election equally came with marked improvement in the performance of women in electoral politics as more women contested for offices and there was also a slight increase in the number of those who succeeded. The election produced; 9 women Senators, 28 female members of House of Representatives, 42 females in the State Houses of Assembly, 6 female Deputy Governors, and 8 female Cabinet Ministers. In the 2011 general elections, more women defied the odds and stepped out to contest for party primaries although many lost, yet a significant 5 number won the party primaries and hence, contested for elective positions in their different political parties. Data has that, in the 2011 general election, female candidates constituted 9.1% of the total number of candidates who contested elections into National Assembly across the political parties. There were 3,306 candidates, with men accounting for 3004 (90.9%) and women 302(9.1%). Despite the relatively many female aspirants, only few emerged as candidates, and fewer of them emerged as winners at the poll.
This therefore, could be seen in the outcome of winners into the upper house of the just concluded 2011 general election were only 7 women got seats out of the 109 members, accounting for just 6.42% of women in the house. These women include: Nkechi J.Nwaogu (PDP) from Abia Central, Helen U.Esuene (PDP) from Akwa Ibom South, Nenadi Usman (PDP) from Kaduna South, Oluremi Tinuba (ACN) of Lagos Central, Zainab Abdulkadir Kure (PDP) from Niger South District and Aisha Jummai (PDP) of Taraba North District. Therefore, these brought the need to promote gender sensitivity in federal governance through the introduction of affirmatives action (Irabor, 2012).
Over the years, affirmative action has been part and parcel of humanity. According to Igwe (2007:6), “affirmative action is a policy, usually springing out of a sense of collective responsibility and, sometimes also guilt, and so, intended to redress past injustices imposed by society or its governments upon sections of the population”. Affirmative action is referred to as, positive policies and policy measures designed to favour a disadvantaged group or reverse discrimination. It is targeted at remedying past discriminations thereby preventing a continuum of inequity and injustice based on gender, hence generating discrimination against women in perpetuity. As opined by Mullen (2011), he defined it as attempt to make progress towards substantive rather than merely formal equality of opportunities for those groups that have been disadvantaged in the past. He further opined that it takes into account under representation and insignificant occupation of positions in the society (Mullen in Shetting, 2001).
As a matter of history, affirmative action has its roots in the Civil Rights Movement in the United States of America whereby President John .F. Kennedy by Executive Order 10925 established the President’s Commission on Equal Employment Opportunities Order which provides that: 6
Contractors doing business with the American government will take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed and employees are treated during their employment without regard to their race, color or national origin (Robert 2009,http://www.ansers.com/topic/affirmative action). By 1964, affirmative action was solidified by the Civil Right Acts. However, there is no doubt that political affirmative action has long been introduced and practiced within the boundary of Nigeria. Initially, during colonial rule, it focused on improving the male gender but now, the focus has shifted to women as the inequality between men and women in relation to economic, social and political emancipation. In reality, different forms of affirmative action have been practiced in Nigeria since the arrival of the colonial masters.
However, in a bid to address the causes and consequences of gender inequality, the government had recently (since 1999) adopted some global, regional, sub-regional and national initiatives which she has either acceded to or integrated their relevant provisions into sectoral policies impinging on the welfare of women. In 1995, the Nigerian Federal Character Commission, likewise the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs, was established. In 2000, a visible Gender Based Affirmative Action was introduced. The Constitution of Nigeria without any iota of doubt is the supreme law and grundnorm from which and other laws are rooted. Affirmation action is a constitutional provision on the principles of equal opportunity and equality of all persons before the law, as 1999 Constitution of Nigeria acknowledged that the composition of the government of the federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the Federal Character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity and also command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that government or in any of its agencies. All which were aimed at bridging the inequality lacuna between both genders and to enhance holistic women participation in all sectors.
However, irrespective of the introduction of affirmative actions, many militating factors against Nigerian women participation in politics (federal governance) still persist. These militating factors ranged from financial constraints, violence, socio-cultural challenges to electoral malpractices among others. Hence; in evaluating the effectiveness of federal affirmative 7 action, the study discovered that the goals of affirmative action have not been actualized because the government is yet to fully commit and to place gender equality above national development in her policies. In affirming the above, the question is, have women been considered in constituting the government at both federal and local level? According to NPC (1991), Women make up about 49% of the Nigeria Population. Yet occupy less than 10% in federal governance. The discrimination is glaring especially when the present government promised to have at least 30% (prescribed quotas as status of women) women representative in its executive. Irrespective of the goals, policies, and campaigns of affirmative action since 1999, how many women are currently being appointed and elected into Federal Government in Nigeria?
1.2 Statement of the Problem Every society is made up of two indispensable complementary genders namely; male and female gender and each needs the other to survive. Unfortunately, women who constitute half of the population of the country and make up 64% of voters, have but less than 10% of representation in the national government. Therefore, one of the problems posed in the study of this gender sensitivity is the existence of imbalances in the ratio, quota and level of representation of both genders in the federal governance. As noted by Iloh and Ikenna (2009: 117), “women constitute almost half of the country and make up 64% of voters, yet have insignificant percentage of representative in the National Government. Their numerical strength has not translated into improved representation unlike their male counterparts”. The under representation of women both in appointive and elective offices negates the principle of democracy as against the strongest index for measuring democracy which being that, everybody irrespective of sex has the freedom to participate and be involved in politics and governance of his or her country.
As noted by (Ako-Nai, 2005: 491; Muhammed, 2006:510; Okoosi-Simbine, 2006:153; Iloh and Ikenna, 2009:117), “Gender discrimination remains a formidable barrier to women’s participation in formal decision making process and their control of political resources. Comparatively, the rate at which men participate in politics is incredibly higher than their female counterparts. This is not to say that, there has not been an increase in the trend of women participation in politics in terms of appointments and elections, but the participation is considered low considering the international standard of 30% benchmark. For instance, in 1992, 8 under Babaginda’s Administration, out of 300 gubernatorial aspirants, only 8 were women representing 2.6% and none of these women were elected as governor”. Research has shown that exclusion of women in the party executives contributes in no small measure to the marginalization of women in politics, especially during party nominations.
For the past 27 years, election of women into National Assembly has not gone beyond 8.3%. Research revealed that in 1999, out of 978 contestable seats in the 36 Houses of Assembly, men occupied 966 leaving 12 seats for women representing 1.2%; there was upward movement in 2003 where women occupied 39 out of 951 seats representing 4%. In 2007, women occupied 54 seats out of total of 990 with the percentage of 5.5. In the House Representative, in 1999, out total 360 seats, women occupied 13 representing 3.6%. In 2003, men occupied 318 out of 339 leaving 21 seats for women accounting for 3.6%. The number increased in 2007 with women occupying a total of 25 seats representing 7%. The story was the same in the senate where in 1999; women occupied 3 seats out of a total of 109 representing 2.8%. In 2003, men occupied 105 out of 109 seats leaving 4 for women accounting for 3.7%. In 2007, women increased to occupy 9 seats out of 109 accounting for 8.3% representation, and in 2011 election, dropping to 8 women representative in senate, Nigeria (CEDAW, 2008).
However, many problematic factors have contributed to the advancement of these disparities of gender sensitivity in Nigeria federal governance, some of which are; poor gender and cultural practices - Pre-determined social roles assigned to women - Male dominance and control - Conflicting demands on the time of women candidates due to their domestic and social responsibilities - Women’s lack of confidence to run election - Women’s perception of politics as a dirty game - High cost of election. According to CEDPA (1997:8), “women are not well represented in decision-making, both within the household and in public life due to several factors like; most women have to get permission from their husbands to attend a meeting or be involved in some activity outside the home. They have less bargaining power, which may be dependent on their ability to earn 9 income. Women also, are still largely responsible for household labour and childcare, finding they have little or no time left to participate in other activities. Religious and cultural traditions create barriers and constraints for women, prescribing what a woman may or may not do and contributing to the acceptance of the status quo, no matter how repressive. Compared to men, women have less access to crucial resources such as information, education, skill training, health (especially reproductive health and family planning), cash income, and credit, all of which are necessary for survival within the current stifling economic-depression”. Nomination and selection processes of candidates in political parties usually consider women as second best. In most cases, women are usually considered fit for nomination only if they have powerful men as their pillars. Besides, the processes are usually so heavily monetized that most women within lean financial muscles are elbowed out of the race from the outset. In affirmation to the above, WRAPA (2003), indicated these factors: Financial constraints, violence, socio-cultural constraints, electoral mal-practices, zoning system, apathy in support of female aspirants, lack of capacity, weak constituency base, mechanism and ‘godfatherism,’ as responsible for the failure of some women candidates in the 2003 election primaries. All these were energetic problems which hindered active participation and representation of women in Nigerian politics (Federal Governance). Leadership during colonial period of Nigeria was dominated by Britons. The Queen of England ruled the colony through her agents as governors. Political affirmative action came after much agitation by Nigerian elites who have schooled abroad. Some of which are: Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Herbert Macauley, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Anthony Enahora and Dennis Osadebe, with time the colonial masters allowed them to participate in governing their country, especially by the 1946 Richards Constitution which introduced Constitutional Reforms. In the Post Colonial system precisely, in the year 2000, there was an introduction of the National Policy on Women; which was a form of affirmative action. Among other actions or activities by the government to boost women representation in federal governance are; Nigeria’s effort in haven signed and ratified some gender sensitive and related international treaties without reservation. Some of which include; her participation in the Convention on the Elimination of all Form of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) adopted in 1981, and its Women’s Rights Protocol of 2003; the ECOWAS Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance of 2001; and the New Partnership for African 10
Development (NEPAD) adopted in July 2001; the World Conference on Women (the Beijing Conference) in 1995. Nationally, the establishment of Nigeria Federal Character in 1996, Federal Ministry of Women Affairs in 2000, the National Gender Policy of 2006, the introduction cum provisions of the 1999 Constitution, the Better Life Programme in 1987, Women for Change Initiative in 2011 championed by the First Lady and Wife of the President, Dame Patience Jonathan which is aimed at achieving 35% representation for women in all states and federal government.
The legal framework of a Nation is perhaps the most direct measure of its commitment to new policy initiatives. The National Policy on women having been formulated by the executive arm of government will be an incomplete exercise without the necessary legal backings hence, the proposed changes will remain unenforceable, if the national assembly continues to refused the domestication of impacting gender policies like the notorious Women’s Bill Right Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) 1979. This CEDAW contains all the provisions of the National Policy on Women as executively ordered by Former President Olusengu Obasanjo and that the enactment will enthrone women’s human rights in Nigeria and women’s re-positioning in the affairs of the nation. The rationale is that, lack of legislation gives room for non-implementation of even the best polices particularly if it is within the provisions of Chapter II of the 1999 Constitution of Federal Republic Nigeria which is factually where most policies that affect women reside.
The problem does not mainly lie with making gender sensitive affirmatives action, rather implementing those laws. Since 1999, many gender sensitive affirmatives action have been made with little or no effort put in place towards achieving their goals, because the composition of those in governance who are to enforce them are mostly men, hence enforcing them means shrinking their status and ability to retain greater position of power. This problem therefore, posses a great challenge to the attainment of gender sensitivity policy goals of affirmative action since 1999.
In summary, one can say that, there has been a gross under-representation of the female gender in Nigerian governance as women who contribute 64% of votes occupy less than 10% in federal governance. The implication of this include that, it demotes and inhabits the achievement of sustainable development; it also fosters poverty, poor health and living standard of women; 11 and the overall implication being that, the entire national economy and political development suffer. As a guide to this inquiry, we raise the following questions:
1. Why was Gender Sensitivity considered a significant component of Federal Affirmative Action since 1999? 2. Has the Gender Sensitivity Policy achieved the goals of Federal Affirmative Action since 1999?
1.3 Objectives of the Study The study hopes to: 1. Establish why Gender Sensitivity was considered a significant component of Federal Affirmative Action since 1999. 2. Find out if Gender Sensitivity has achieved the goals of Federal Affirmative Action since 1999? Why was Gender Sensitivity, considered a significant component of Federal Affirmative Action since 1999?
According to Anifowose (2004), some established democracies like Britain and United States of America, democratic polyarchies, for a long time, were in fact male polyarchies. Even famous advocates of democratic and republican government rejected claims that women should be full citizens. For the most part, they adopted the prevailing view that the proper role of women was marriage, procreation and family, not politics. Thus, John Locke held that “all men are by nature equal”, they never recommended that women be allowed to vote and considered it more or less self-evident that in family matters, the husbands have the final say.
Pointing to the historical origin of male domination, as stated by Anifowose (2004), it was impossible, but believed that one highly plausible explanation was to be found in physical deference. Men are generally heavier, taller and even physically stronger than women and therefore more capable than women to enforce their will through physical violence and threat of violence. Women on the other hand are vulnerable because of their role of child bearing and nursing. Contributing to this, is the discrimination and subjection of women which is further enforced by custom, traditional, practices, beliefs and the law, behind which stood the coercive force of the state. This however, shows that discrimination against women has its root on the 12 nature of our societies which acknowledge men as being unique, stronger and fit for the public space while women are feeble and weak and meant to stay within the confluence of the private space. This without doubt, has gone a long way to affect women’s perception of politics and has therefore caused very low level of political interest, knowledge and activity of women in politics.
In addition therefore, the plight of Nigerian women have been marked by under- representation, undue dominance of men in the socio-political scheme of things, lopsided political appointments and the general imbalances associated with very unjust treatment of the female citizens in its entirety. The Nigerian women is therefore discriminated upon from, in most cases, acquiring formal education, mistreated and perpetually kept as house-help; the average Nigerian women is seen as an available objective for prostitution, forced marriage, street hawking, instrument of wide-range trafficking and a misfit in the society. This trend contradicts the collective interests of human fundamental rights and the rights of equality, freedom and personal dignity of women in society. This attitude also negates the principle of the esteemed affirmative action and the Beijing conventions on the inalienable rights of women. This culture is equally a serious threat on Nigeria’s path to democratic consolidation and sustainable development in the country (Erunke, 2012).
Given the fact that under-representation of women in Nigeria according to Erunke (2012), negates the collective interests of human fundamental rights and the rights of equality, freedom and personal dignity of women in society; fall short of all necessary dictates of the principle of cherished affirmative action of Beijing Convention on the inalienable rights of women, and importantly the tradition equally poses great threat on Nigeria’s path to democratic consolidation and sustainable development in the country. Hence, promoting gender equality is a development strategy for reducing poverty level among women and men; improving health and living standards as well as enhancing efficiency of public investments. Attaining gender equality is not only an end in itself and human right issue, but is also a prerequisite for the achievement of sustainable development. Gender equality and women empowerment has continued to remain a topical theme in global treaties and declarations because they are acknowledged as catalysts to people-centered development strategies which focus on poverty reduction, improved standard of living, and good governances that give men and women equal voices in decision making and policy implementation. Therefore, there is vital need to solve this problem, which in bid to 13 solving, gender sensitivity has been considered a significant component of affirmative action since 1999 because the federal government has placed women equality over and above national development in its policies.
Has Gender Sensitivity achieved the Goals of Federal Affirmative Action since 1999?
According to Igwe (2007:6), “affirmative action is a policy, usually springing out of a sense of collective responsibility and, sometimes also guilt, and so, intended to redress past injustices imposed by society or its governments upon sections of the population”. As opined by Mullen (2011), he explained affirmative action as attempts to make progress towards substantive rather than merely formal equality of opportunities for those groups that have been disadvantage in the past. He further stated that it takes into account under representation and insignificant occupation of positions in the society. However, there is no doubt that affirmative action has long been introduced and practiced within the shores of Nigeria in both economic and political sphere. Initially under colonial rule, it was focused on improving the male gender but today, the focus has shifted to women as the inequality between men and women in relation to economic, social and political emancipation seem to increase negatively the power play and boost underdevelopment of the nation. Thus has remained the instrument of increased poverty and squalor in our society. For the poverty of the women folk equates the poverty of any nation. To tackle this gender imbalance, some gender sensitivity policies aimed at achieving the goal of federal affirmative action has been introduced before, since and after 1999.
Women in Northern Nigeria got the franchise to vote and to be voted for by the introduction of 1979 Constitution. Prior to the date, they were not allowed to vote or be voted for into positions of authority. Even though it is a constitutional right for all qualified Nigerians to vote and be voted for, women did not seem to enjoy this right fully because of factors or practices that hindered them from so doing. Hence, the 1979 Constitution was a form of policy that bridged the gender gap by promoting or encouraging northern women to participate in politics of Nigeria. In order to further enhance gender sensitivity, Nigeria has signed and ratified some gender sensitive and related international treaties without reservation. Some of these include; her participation in the Convention on the Elimination of all Form of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), African Charter on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) adopted in 1981, and its Women’s Rights Protocol of 2003; the World Conference on Women (the 14
Beijing Conference) in 1995. Nationally, the establishment of Nigeria Federal Character in 1996, Federal Ministry of Women Affairs in 2000, the National Gender Policy of 2006, the introduction cum provisions of the 1999 Constitution, Women for Change Initiative in 2011 championed by the First Lady and Wife of the President, Dame Patience Jonathan which is aimed at achieving 35% representation for women in all states and federal government, are forms of affirmatives actions by the federal government (Agbalajobi, 2009).
The 1979 Nigerian Constitution guaranteed the rights of women to participate in active politics; however the last decade witnessed a relative increase in women’s participation. This is only when we measure increase in participation with certain standard like the number of women who vote in elections; the number of public offices held by women; number of women related policies made by government etc. Over the years, there has been a remarkable increase in women’s participation in Nigerian politics, considering these standards, yet there is inherently a pronounced level of under-representation of women in politics when compared with their male counterparts (Agbalajobi, 2009).
Irrespective of all these Gender Sensitive Policies and Programmes including the introductions of National Gender Policy in 2006, Nigerian women who constitute about 50% of the nation’s population are not yet represented in politics and decision making bodies. They are still inadequately represented at the National Assembly likewise at the State Houses of Assembly and at the Local Government Councils, women are either completely absent or grossly under- represented as well as at the highest decision making of the executive and judicial arms of government. An assessment of the fortunes of women in Nigeria politics from 1999 when democracy was re-introduced in the country after over fifteen years of military interregnum, reveals that there was some gradual upward growth in number of women contesting for and getting elected into elective positions. But this sharply took a downward curve in the last election of April 2011, when in spite of the 35% affirmative action campaign, women contested for elective positions but the number of winners was disturbingly less than the former polls. Statistics show that, out of 109 senators elected from across the 36 states of the federation, only 7 were women (6.42%), but when the figure is placed against February 2007 election figures which shows that 9 women had won elections as senators which represent a not too impressive 8.25%. The 2003 election figures was less encouraging with only 4 women representing 3.67% 15 were elected, while in 1999, only 3 female politicians won senatorial elections representing 2.75% of the total figure. The story was not too different as this same pattern was replicated in the House of Representative where the figures have fluctuated over time. For instance, only 19 women won elections into the House of 360 members of the Lower Chamber which represent 5.27% in the April 2011 polls. However, 2007 election was better of as women got 27 seats representing 7.5% and in 2003, with 21 seats accounting for 5.8%. In 1999, they got 12 seats amounting to 3.3% of the total seats in the House of Representative (Abuah, 2012).
According to (Nda, 2003:334; Iioh and Ikenna, 2009:117), “in 1999-2003, the Obasanjo government made a clear departure and appointed 4 women out of the 29 senior ministers representing 13.7%, and 3 out of the 18 junior ministers representing 13.7%, with 2 women advisers, 2 senior special assistants, 6 special assistants, 1 special assistant to the vice president and 8 permanent secretaries as against what was obtainable prior to 1999, where women representation in the federal executive council never exceeded 5%”. Irrespective of experiencing progression in the number of appointive positions occupied by women from 1999 to date, the fact remains that the degree of improvement is marginal showing that, women are still very long away from achieving 35% political recognition in the electoral space of Nigeria. In contrary to all the signed treaties, the gender advocacy for adequate representation of women in politics and affirmative action put in place since 1999, it could therefore be said that, the gender sensitivity policy has not achieved the goal of federal affirmative action since 1999. It is on this that the research is set to answer some questions.
1.4 Significance of the Study For many years, gender sensitivity has been, and remained a crucial social issue in the modern research. An analysis on gender sensitivity shows that the more affirmative action on gender sensitivity is unachieved, the more it hampers national development hence perpetuating poverty, low standard of living, apathy and under-representation of women in governance. Synthesizing facts from the theoretical and practical importance of this research, its relevance finds expression in the following;
i) Theoretically, this study shall lead to the understanding and explanation of not only the formulation of affirmative action but equally the mutual causalities and direct correlation between gender sensitivity and national development. 16
ii) Practically, the study shall sensitize policy makers on the need for adequate implementation of gender sensitivity policies in order to achieve the goals of federal affirmative action in Nigeria.
Categorically, gender sensitivity is a sensitive, timely and crucial social issue in the modern research. Hence, the research has both the theoretical and practical significances.
Theoretically, it will be of immense assistance in the sense that, it will add to the already existing literature which many people and scholars will read and acquire more knowledge on gender sensitivity in Nigerian federal governance, and its effect on affirmative action since 1999. It will equally help to enrich the contemporary body of literature in the library in the area of gender sensitivity. The research also, will be kept in the departmental library of political science, which will promote further research on the topic. This study will evaluate the level of women’s participation in politics. It will identify obstacles that deter them from effectively participating in federal governance, and to analyze those affirmatives action government, if any, has put in place since 1999 as well as offering recommendations. On the practical side of significances of this study; the project will be useful to; the three arms of Federal Government of Nigeria (Executive, Legislative and Judiciary), the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs, Independent National Electoral Commission, different State Governments and her arms, Local Government officials, political analysts, social analysts in making, political stakeholders, non-governmental agencies, politicians, concerned citizens and other researchers who will find the material useful in one way or the other. For instance, some strategic policies could be made to enforce several affirmative action identified by the government, which will in-return enhance better representation of women in politics, especially in federal governance.
This research work can provoke further researches. The study as well, will expand the intellectual horizon of my lecturers on the issue of gender sensitivity and its effect on affirmative action since 1999. Also, other affected organizations and countries could borrow a leaf from the findings and hence, fashion out strategies toward projecting effective representation of their women into different decision making bodies which indeed, will make for real democratization of the institution or political system as case may be. 17
Through this study, women will get to understand the level of their marginalization in the society and therefore, get propelled to plunge into the political terrain for effective participation and representation in federal governance.
1.5 Operational Definition
In order to avoid ambiguity or misconception of ideas, the researcher has chosen to give meanings to some key words used in this work, they include;
Gender According to Akani (2004), gender is the attribution of male and female labels to the social roles and characteristics of persons. These attributions are acquired by a process of socialization. The researcher, referred to the female gender in this study. Gender Sensitivity This deals with ability to recognize gender issues and to recognize women’s different social position and gender roles. It is the awareness and insight into the state of the other sex, with reference to historical roots of sexist stereotyping, discrimination and violence. Political Participation This could be referred to as, the act of taking part or being involved in politics. It also means those actions of the masses, by which they seek to influence or support government and politics. In this work, women political participation as used denotes women involvement in political activities (representation) in Nigeria. INEC INEC means, Independent National Electoral Commission. It was established in accordance with Sec 153(F) of the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria. Her comprehensive functions are stipulated in the Part 1 of the Third Schedule of the 1999 Constitution. However, the Commission is popularly known as the body responsible for conducting election in Nigeria. Affirmative Action Affirmative Action simply refers to a policy action that favours marginalized group in a society such as women. While it is a special measure, it is not considered discriminatory since it aims to accelerate the attainment of equality between the dominant and marginalized group.
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CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW
In order to obtain answers possessed in the research questions of this study, we shall thematically review some related literatures concerned with: Definition of core concepts in the study (Theoretical Review), Status of Gender Equality and Situation of Women in Nigeria, Levels of Gender Representation in Nigerian Federal Governance, Factors Militating against Effective Participation of Women in Federal Politics, Gender and Internal Party Politics in Nigeria and the Prospects of Electoral Reforms for Nigerian Women. We shall equally review works connected to Gender Sensitivity, Sustainable Development and the Effects on Affirmative Action since 1999. And lastly, evaluate the goals of Affirmatives Action since 1999.
2.1 The Concept of Gender Sensitivity According to Akani (2004), gender is the attribution of male and female labels to the social roles and characteristics of persons. These attributions are acquired by a process of socialization. As conceived by Snyder and Tadesse (1995:14), gender is “a social construct that asserts that the expectations and responsibilities of men and women are not always biologically determined, but also cultural principles and practices”. They posted that gender as a concept easily accommodates race, class, and ethnicity. Gender refers to socially constructed roles of women and men ascribed to them on the basis of their sex, whereas the term sex refers to biological and physical characteristics (UN, 1999). Gender sensitivity is therefore, the awareness and insight into the state of the other sex, with reference to historical roots of sexist stereotyping, discrimination and violence. It acknowledges the different roles and responsibilities of women and men in the community, and the relationship between them. Men and women are different; therefore their experiences, needs, issues and priorities are different. Gender sensitivity equally deals with the ability to recognize gender issues and to recognize women’s different perceptions and interests arising from their different social positions and gender roles.
2.2 The Concept of Affirmative Action The Concept “Affirmative Action” is a special consideration for disadvantaged group in publicly funded opportunities. The aim is to level the playing field as the groups preferred are 19 often those that have discriminated against in the past. The concept of affirmative action has its background from the American State in the 1960s which was aimed at correcting the gender disparities that exists in that society in spite of constitutional guarantees to forestall the trend and instill equality in the system. However, according to Igwe (2007:6), “affirmative action is a policy, usually springing out of a sense of collective responsibility and, sometimes also guilt, and so, intended to redress past injustices imposed by society or its governments upon sections of the population”. Nkechi (1996) and Dudley (1982) wrote that, Affirmative Action is a creation of the New Deal Wagner Act of 1935 that sought to address critical issues of unfair labour practices. As noted by Mna (1982:14), the concept aptly describes; Certain measures intended to supplement non-discrimination and encompasses a host of policies that seek to support weak and vulnerable groups in the society, affirmative action pre-occupies itself with policies such as dissemination of information, consciousness raising, faith-based efforts to recruit women through training programmes, school desegration, and in extreme cases, activities that aims at reversing all forms of gender dislocation, (Mna 1982:14).
From the above, the concept of Affirmative Action is a mechanism for social control geared towards generating a balanced society for over all interest of the citizenry. The situation in Nigeria since inception of democracy in 1999 has assumed a dangerous and disparate dimension more source that the female folk are largely sidelined or given very slim chances to contest for public offices. This trend has reduced an average Nigerian woman to a second fiddle thereby, leaving room for marginalization of women as a result of domination of the political terrain by the male folk (Jitu, 2000). This condition therefore has led to several gender struggles clamouring for the introduction and implementation of gender affirmative action in the country.
2.3 Status of Gender Equality and Situation of Women in Nigeria Gender issue is a crucial issue not limited to any particular country like Nigeria, but has rather become a global problem. As stated by ILO (2004), women constitute 60% of the world’s 550 million working poor surviving on $ 1 or less per day. 20
Similarly, According to GETW (2004), it stated that in 2003, some 1.1billion of the world’s 2.8 billion workers or 40% were women.
As opined by Elagab (2010):
In terms of food alone, women globally produce half of the world’s food yet they constitute 70% of the world’s 1.3 billion absolute poor, while they work two- thirds of the world’s working hours, they own less than 1% of the world women globally still have only 36% of the total wage employment and only 1/3 rd of the share of national income (Elagab in Adegoroye, 2005:2-3). In confirming the ugly global status of women in the society, a study conducted by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) in 1994 showed that, while 89.50% of parliamentarians were males, and that participation of women in National Parliaments are on the average a mere 10%. However, gender participation in governance has equally remained a typical issue in Nigeria, as there also existed a clear inequality in the levels of gender representation in the federal governance.
However, as highlighted by World Bank (2005:6), “Nigeria is highly patriarchal society, where men dominate all spheres of women’s lives. Women are in a subordinate positions (particularly at the community and household level), and male children are preferred over the female. The influence of the mother and the father is particularly significant in shaping and perpetrating patriarchy. The mother provides the role model for daughters, while the fathers demonstrate to sons what it means to be a man”. As in other male dominated societies, the social relations and activities of Nigerian women and men are governed by patriarchal system of socialization and cultural practices which favour the interest of men above those of women. Consequently, a high percentage of women’s employment is restricted to low income generating activities, concentrated within the lower levels of the unregulated, informal sector which are not adequately represented in the National Accounting System (NAS). By comparison, men employed within the informal sector are located in the upper levels and are pre-dominantly engaged in higher income-generating activities. The need to support initiatives that ensure financial independence for women is a critical step for mainstreaming gender into governance, especially with respect to politics and public life in order to liberate Nigerians human capital 21 resources for active participation in the vision for a free market economy (CIDA NIG.GSAA 2006). However, despite a general commitment to the principle of non-discrimination as enshrined in Section 2 of the 1999 Constitution Of Federal Republic Of Nigeria, Nigeria falls short of the desired result of giving males and females’ equal opportunities to advance socially, physically, educationally, politically and economically. Evidences abound that several negative aspects of gender relations, such as gender-based division of labour, disparities between males and females access to power and resources, and gender biases in rights and entitlements, remain pervasive in Nigeria. By the Constitution of Nigeria, Civil and Political Rights (Chapter 4 of the 1999 Constitution) are actionable in a court of law whilst economic, social and cultural rights (Chapter 2 of the 1999 Constitution) are not. Section 43 permits both male and female Nigerians to own and acquire moveable and immoveable property in spite of this, a large population of women in Nigeria are barred from owning land by customary law of inheritance. Assessing gender and livelihood, there is a sharp contrast between the income generating and livelihood opportunities of women and men which persist across multiple sectors in Nigeria. For instance, women participation in the industrial sector is 11% as compared with 30% for men. Women represent 87% of those employed in the service sector, which involves predominately informal and unregulated forms of employment. Women’s participation in income generating activities that are predominately characterized by intense manual labour, such as mining, and quarrying is virtually nonexistent largely due to gender-related perceptions regarding the social construction of labour and production related activities (NBS, 2004). In the Federal Civil Service, which is the largest single-entity employer in Nigeria, 76% of civil servants are men whereas 24% are women, and women hold less than 14% of total management level positions. Women represent 17.5% and men 82.5% of those employed within the medical field, which generally involves highly skilled and relatively well-remunerated work. The gender inequality treatment is not different when it comes to gender role and division of labour as well as economy. Institutional practices and perception of gender roles also have an important impact on the equitable enjoyment of employment privileges and incentives, in both urban and rural settings. For example, tax authorities generally assume that male breadwinners bear the sole responsibility for meeting the financial and material needs of families and neglect to acknowledge the existence of female headed households. Accordingly, tax benefits related to 22 childcare are restrictively granted to male workers whereas female workers (including single mothers and divorced women with children in their care as well as married women, some of whom are family breadwinners), as a result of being denied access to these benefits, tend to pay relatively higher taxes, Economically, gender inequalities within the overall society, and across all sectors, reflect the wide disparities between women and men which in turn, contribute to uneven development and the feminization of poverty. Among the 70% of the population estimated to be living below poverty line, over 65% are projected to be women. Income and purchasing power is estimated to be US $1,495 for men as compared to US $ 614 for women, and men have greater access to high-paying secured employment. For example, 76% federal civil service workers are men, where as women make up 24% of the work force and occupy less than 14% of the overall management positions, despite the appointment of women to the position of permanent secretaries beginning in 2000 as in line with Affirmative Action Initiatives (CIDA, 2006).
2.4 Levels of Gender Representation in Federal Governance
The introduction of the 1979 Constitution was meant to guarantee the rights of women to participate in active politics likewise the male gender. Upon this right, no gender or sex was to be discriminated from participating in politics of the country. However, women’s yearnings to participate in governance were premised on grounds that: women in Nigeria represent half of the population and hence should be allowed a fair share in decision making, and the governance of the country. Secondly, that all human beings are equal and women posses the same rights as men to participate in governance and public life. The right to democratic governance is an entitlement conferred upon all citizens by law. The 1999 Nigeria Constitution by virtue of Section 40, states that:
Every person shall be entitled to assemble freely And associate with other persons, and In Particular He may form or belong to any Political party, trade Union or any other association for the protection of His interest provided that the provisions of this section Shall not derogate from the powers conferred by this Constitution on the INEC with respect to political Parties to which that Commission does not accord recognition (1999 Nigeria Constitution, Sec. 40). 23
Section 42(1) of the Constitution states further that:
A citizen of Nigeria of a particular community, Ethnic group, place of origin, sex, religion, or Political opinion shall not, by reason only that He is such a person be subjected to any form of Discrimination.
Irrespective of the above provisions, Agbalajobi (2009) ascertains that in practice, there is extensive discrimination as few and almost insignificant numbers of women were elected into various positions in the 1999, 2003 and 2007 general elections held in the country. According to him, men still dominate most public offices till date, female gubernatorial candidates have emerged but none has ever won and same goes for the presidency. Legislative representation has equally witnessed the presence of women yet they remain under represented when compared to their male counter parts.
For over 27 years, election of women into National Assembly has not gone beyond 10%. In 1992, only one woman emerged a senator out of 90 seats and 14 out of 575 in the House of Representatives. In 1999, out of 978 contestable seats in 36 Houses of Assembly, men occupied 966 leaving 12 seats for women, representing1.2%. There was upward movement in 2003 where women occupied 39 out of 951 seats, counting for 4%. In 2007, women occupied 54 seats out of total of 990 with the percentage of 5.5. In federal level in the year 1999, women got hold of 13 seats out of 360 seats in the house of representative, accounting for 3.6%, and in 2003, men occupied 318 out of 339 leaving 21 seats for women depicting 3.6% representation. The number was increased in 2007 with women stepping up to a total of 25 seats accounting for 7% .the pathetic incident remained same as poor representation of women in the senate prevailed. Hence in 1999 women occupied 3 seats out of a total of 109, representing 2.8%. In 2003, men took 105 out of 109 seats leaving 4 for women (3.7%). In 2007, women managed to seize 9 seats out of 109, representing 8.3% which as a whole depicts gross under- representation of women in federal governance (Dare and Folorunso, 2010).
As noted by Abiola (2011), the under representation of women in the very process of decision making and implementation undermines fundamental concept of democratic form of governance, which assumes that participation and representation in all levels of public life will 24 be equally available to women and men. Nigerian politics is such that has undermined female legitimacy, resulting in women political powerlessness, this accruing from the reason that, there exist clear gender imbalance or inequality with regards to representation of women in federal governance. Pitiably, women who constitute about 50% of the population are yet poorly under- represented in the country’s federal governance. The table below shows women representation in Nigerian national assembly in 1980 and 1992.
Table 1: Women in the Nigerian National Assembly (1980-1992)
Women Men % of women % of men Senate 1 56 1.8 98.2 House of representative 3 442 0.7 99.3 1992 Women Men % of women % of men Senate 1 90 1.0 99 House of representatives 14 575 2.4 97.6 Source: the Nigerian CEDAW NGO coalition Shadow Report (2008), New York, United Nations Committee on Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women.
As opined by Abuah (2012), the level of male’s participation in Nigeria federal governance has been on an increasing stable level unlike their female counterpart whose poor level of participation has been fluctuating negatively. From 1999, when democracy was reintroduced into the country, after a long period of over fifteen years of military interregnum, it is revealed that, there has been a gradual upward increase in the number of women varying for and getting elected into elective positions, but this suddenly decreased given the outcome of 2011 April Generally Election which was ironically, the year when gender advocacy and affirmative action attained its most prominent visibility profile, when the presidency took it up as a campaign initiative. In spite of the 35% Affirmative Action campaign, the number of female winners in the 2011 April General Election was disturbingly less than the previous (2007) polls. As statistics has that the election of 2011 produced only 7 women out of 109 Senators, accounting for a pathetic 6.42% representation of women in the Senate, as against the February 2007 election figures where 9 women won elections into the Upper House (Senate) which represent a not too impressive 8.25%. The level of female representation dropped in 2003 to 3.67% as just 4 women got elected and worst of all in 1999 election with only 3 female politicians emerging winners in the senatorial election, representing 2.75% of the total figure. 25
She further stated that, this pattern of unstable and under-representation of the female gender in federal governance was replicated in the House of Representative where the figures kept fluctuating. For instance, only 19 women made it to the 360 members of the lower chamber, representing 5.27% of the concluded April 2011 polls. The representation fared better in 2007 election given women’s occupation of 27seats (7.5%), and in 2000, with 21 seats accounting for 5.8%. The level of representation dropped further in 1999 as women had 12 seats which equates to 3.3% of the total seats in the house of representative at that time. The figures show that, there had been some marginal increase from 1999 until April 2011, when the percentage figures dropped slightly, but there was equally a greater level of some very active participation increase on the part of women both as aspirants and candidates in the entire election process. In a hard cold analysis however, these figures and percentages indicate that women are still, very far from achieving 35% political recognition in the electoral space. According to him, the discrimination of women in federal governance is equally manifested with the activities of political parties, for instance, in 2007 none of the over 60 political parties fielded a single female presidential candidate, and the only notable female aspirant, Mrs. Sarah Jibril who vied for the post of president under the umbrella of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was jettisoned out during the primaries as she earned just a vote. Also, no woman has become a vice president, the senate president or deputy senate president since 1999.
In 2007, Mrs. Patricia Etteh was elected Speaker of House of Representative but succumbed to the wily machinations of political intrigues when she became a victim of the high wire end game for parliamentary power and was implicated in the controversy surrounding the rehabilitation of the speakers, residence. Till date, no woman has smelled the post, which equally depicts poor representation of women in Nigerian federal governance.
2.5 Factors Militating against Active Participation of Women in Nigerian Politics According to Irabor (2012), Nigeria’s democratic culture is majorly characterized by factors such as: assassination, lawlessness, illegalities, oppressions, rigging, manipulation, marginalization and violence. Others include: male dominated party executives, labeling, money politics and innumerable social, cultural and religious issues. These constitute barriers to women aspiring and contesting for elective positions in Nigeria. The number of women who contested 26 for elective positions at previous elections was significantly low. In 2011 general elections, an increased number of Nigerian women defied the odds, “stepped into the murky water of politics,” aspired and contested for party primaries, although many lost, yet a significant number compared to previous elections won the party’s primaries and contested for elective positions in the various political parties. In this 2011 general election, data has that, female candidates constituted 9.1% of the total number of candidates who contested into national assembly in the 2011 general election across all the political parties. There were 3306 candidates with men accounting for 3004 (90.9%) and women 302 (9.1%). Despite the many female aspirants, only few emerged as candidates and fewer of them as winners at the polls. In 1999, the overall percentage of women who were successful at the poll was 2%, in 2003, it was 4% and in 2007 it increased to 6% (Irabor, 2012). However, a research conducted by the Women’s Rights Advancement and Protection Alternatives (WRAPA) in 2003 revealed certain factors as obstacles that propelled failures of Nigerian women in the 2003 party primaries. Some of these include:
Financial Constraints - Over 90% of the aspirants cited dearth of resources to meet the basic requirements the political parties would expect all aspirants to meet. They did not have resources to pay their registration fees, establish offices in their constituencies, and maintain the relevant campaign structures and basic logistics such as paying the cost of renting buses to be used by supporters during the campaign. Tax declaration is also another party requirement that proved to be a challenge for some of the aspirants as some of them were not employed in the formal sector or had nothing to declare over the years. For those who were successful in the primaries, many were unable to pay delegates to vote for them because it involved competing with other wealthier opponents (WRAPA, 2003). According to Nda (2003:338), “the high cost of financing political parties and campaigns is a big obstacle to women, as the minimum cost of gubernatorial election could go as high as 200million naira. How many women can mobilize such huge amount of money and how many men can mobilize such amount of money for women? Which political party would nominate a woman for that post considering her very small contribution to party and formation”? 27
Educational Qualification Out of the 835 fully documented aspirants especially those who aspired for the post at state level, many lacked the basic qualification to support their aspiration. The requirement stated for secondary school certificate education was a significant constraint for nearly 50% of the aspirants for state houses of assembly especially in the north, as many had primary school certificate or were “dropouts” from secondary school. Violence Fear of physical harm through open violence and intimidation accounted for the elimination of over 90% of the aspirants and measures to secure security failed to protect the aspirants. As noted by INEC (2006:5), “violence, thuggery and high level of intimidation are among the impediments preventing women from actively participating in politics and governance in Nigeria”. Apathy in Support for Female Aspirants The WRAPA research also shows that, over 70% of aspirants attributed their poor showing to the low level of support they got from women in their different constituencies. Socio-Cultural Challenges or Practices Nearly all aspirants, 98% successful and unsuccessful were put together and were faced with some form of cultural inhabitation or open religious condemnation in their different communities. A number of barriers are imposed on women active participation in politics by so many cultural practices. As clearly stated by (Iloh and Ikenna, 2009:124; Nda, 2003:336), “Nigerian society is permeated by patriarchy whereby women are expected to conform to and confine themselves to male dominance and female subservience. Women are seen to belong to the home, be incapable of making sound decisions and it is unbecoming of women to expose themselves in public for political activities such as campaign rallies. Men often find it incredible and impracticable to see them participating in politics”. Zoning System Some female aspirants suffered the defeat or were edged out through the unconstitutional formular of zoning posts in the name of balance and rotational convention introduced in Nigerian politics by political parties.
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Weak Constituency Base It needs time and money to cultivate voters, and another issue was the weak constituency base of almost 70% of those who withdrew very early in the race. Godfatherism Party officials and some chieftains at all levels were alleged to be aware and partisan in the maneuvers that eliminated most women aspirants. This made it almost impossible for women aspirants who petitioned seeking redress and review to get further than the level of their state or local government leaders. Out of the 66 unsuccessful women aspirants for all posts under Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), only 26 of the petitions were from women who aspired for federal offices with one for governorship. The national headquarters of PDP received the 26 petition through civil society but made it clear that there was little it could do to reverse many of them against the strength of influence of local party chieftain and state executives who were not complying with party guidelines on many issues. Lack of Capacity Even for the few political veterans amongst the aspirants, the coordination of their campaigns fell short of the desired quality to enhance their chances in the primaries. Many had no idea about inter party political maneuvers or advocacy and campaign strategies. The initiatives by civil society groups did not impact sufficiently to secure success for them (WRAPA, 2003). Electoral Mal-Practice According to WRAPA (2003:17) “election fraud and other malpractices accounted for the “defeat” of many of the candidates who withdrew or were edged out before and during the primaries. Many of the parties did not abide by the parties such as disclosure of venue for the primaries. Other violations of party regulations indeed rigging and unrest during party primary elections, on- constitution of electoral panels by parties in some instances there were no primaries held, yet results were declared for favoured candidates”. Some defeated female aspirants complained that lapses and electoral mal-practice by electoral officers in conjunction with other male aspirants made them to lose the primaries. Evaluating other sides of factors militating against effective participation of women in politics, national coalition for affirmatives action attributed the cause also to be connected to the systematic delay with INEC. According to them, the following are inclusive: 29
Partisan Role of INEC in Elections Section 156 of the constitution in creating INEC compromises the intended independent and non-partisanship of the commission. A person cannot be appointed as a member of INEC unless he or she is qualified to be elected as a member of house of representative. Appointing a politician as INEC members erodes the independence of the commission and lays a foundation for partisanship as was clearly witnessed and documented by election observers in the 2007 elections. INEC Inefficiency This has constituted an obstacle to effective participation of women which can be directly traced to INEC’S inadequate or non supply of electoral materials, indiscriminate and arbitrary disqualification of candidates, and deliberate omission of candidate’s names and pictures from the ballot papers. INEC’S Lack of Financial Autonomy INEC lacks financial autonomy which compromises the commission’s ability to an effective election umpire, without independence, it is therefore a non issue to talk about free and fair elections. Rigging and vote manipulation in favour of the ruling party or government is quite common while many voters are disenfranchised due to inability to register. Manipulation of Voters Register Manipulation of electoral roll or register is one way of rigging elections. Section 16 of the 2006 electoral act provides for payment for a certified copy of voters’ registers. The experience of Nigerian voters during 2007 elections was most disturbing. The voters’ register was poorly complied and had many errors and omissions in it. Failure to Punish Violators of Electoral Laws Failure to punish deviant’s political behaviours breeds impunity such as the case recorded of powerful party people and kingmakers who flagrantly violent electoral laws, the rise of godfathers electoral entrepreneurs who have corner the political space, invest money in elections in return for profit, compromises the electoral process. A clear example is the celebrated case between Chris Uba and Chris Ngige. Swearing in Contentious Candidates as “Winners” of Election A candidate who is declared winner is sworn in. A prolonged court case then begins as the winner buys time to remain in office, while his opponent is using personal resources to contest 30 the results in the tribunal, the incumbent uses state resources to fight the opponent as was the case in Kogi, Adamawa, Edo,Enugu,Rivers, Bayelse, Sokoto And Abia State. This underscores the need for election to be conducted on a level playing field. Indigeneity Female aspirants are told that, by marring outside their local governments of birth, they have lost their indigeneity. Women who are married to men who are non-indigenes of the local government areas where they live and work suffer systematic discrimination in their husband’s constituency. They are told that, they do not really belong because indigeneity is based on the consanguinity (blood relations) principle (WRAPA, 2003).
Marginalization of Women in the Political Parties Party politics has remained an exclusive affair of men, no women holds a substantive party position in major political parties except in the new political parties. This is because, women lack the skill to engage in some deviant behaviours which politicians try to legitimize as “politics”, hence; membership interest in political parties by women has been killed. As at 1999, it was 5% women members, 7% female party executives and only 8% qualified as party delegates. In PDP convention, only 5 out of 41 seats (12.19%) went to women, which included positions of the, deputy national secretary, women leader, deputy women leader, 2 national ex-officio members. This is a far cry from 35% minimum representations in the NGP, 15% promised by Former President Obasanjo And 30% By Late President Yar’Adua. No concrete measures were taken by political parties to increase women’s participation. Rather, the parties introduced a waiver of fees for women aspirants. However, there was backlash of waiver of fees. The men said, since women did not pay fees, it was translated as evidence of women’s lack of commitment, reinforcing women as the ‘weaker sex’. This was used as a justification for the exclusion of women. To perfect this exclusion of women, times and venues of elections were changed hours to election and information on such changes was not communicated to them. The political parties began a deliberate and systematic exclusion and substitution of female aspirants by party barons, supported by state party executives at primaries (WRAPA, 2003).
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2.6 Gender and Internal Party Politics in Nigeria Political Party serves as the most viable vehicle through which people are elected into various political positions in Nigeria. As it is her responsibility to always front a party flag bearer in any given election. This is not devoid of some internal party politics in determining the party flag bearers, hence; the emergence, success or failure of any party member (as candidate) is importantly driven by several political intricacies prevalence in party politics. According to Abiola (2011), the under-representation of women in the very process of decision making and implementation undermines the fundamental concept of democratic form of governance, which assumes that participation and representation in all areas and levels of public life will be equally available to women and men. However, politics and political arrangement in Nigeria has undermined female legitimacy resulting in women’s political powerlessness. From the available statistics, women’s over all political representation and participation in government is less than 7%. Among different factors that affect women participation in Nigerian politics are: ideology, gender and cultural patterns, pre-determined social roles assigned to women, male dominance and control, conflicting demands on the time of women candidates due to their domestic and social responsibilities; and women’s lack of confidence to run election. Others include: women perception of politics as a dirty game, lack of funds and resources as politics is heavily monetizes, poverty and unemployment, illiteracy and limited access to education, the dual burden of domestic task and professional obligation, lack of confidence in other women. Political parties on their own side have not bettered the system; rather contribute to increase discouraging of women participation in politics, as they consider them as second best during nomination and selection processes. Given the nature of political party formation, it is usually in form of club and informal meetings initiated by male friends and business partners. Other members of the society, including women are contacted for membership at a much later stage when party structures are already put in place. So, women are naturally excluded from the formation stage of political parties thus denying them of benefits accruing to foundation membership (Dare, 2010). As noted by Abiola (2011), a Review of the Manifestoes and Constitutions of over 30 Political Parties pointed that, most parties paid lip service to women’s political development since they are still considered “outsiders” in the game of politics hence, have refused to 32 practically integrate women’s needs and concern in the business of democracy. There are only few women in the national executive of political parties in Nigeria, who are merely placed to occupy politically redundant positions like, welfare post, social organizer or ex officio positions. For example, the PDP has 52 National Executive Officers out of which only 6 are women with 3 holding Ex-officio positions and 2 occupying the position of National Women and Deputy Leader, and the third the position of Deputy National Publicity Secretary. In the opposition Action Congress (AC), there are only 4 women out of 32 National Executive Officers. The 4 occupy the positions of National Financial Secretary, the Deputy National Publicity Secretary, National Legal Adviser and National Women Leader. In ANPP, there exist 28 National Executive Officers but only 4 are women, 2 National Internal Auditors, one National Women Leader and one Deputy Women Leader. All these forms of marginalization and poor representation of women run through all other parties. Incidentally, an analysis of the manifestoes of the parties’ show the inclusion of gender provisions despite that in practice, this not evidenced. For example, article 6 of PDP manifesto titled “the character of the party” states that, “it shall be a non-tribal, non-religious, and non- sexist democratic organization”. (6.1) section 6.5 say “it shall promote the emancipation of women by encouraging their representation at all levels and combat sexism”. Which in reality, is untrue and impracticable. Hence, if political party that is a foundation for the emergence of people into political offices is not favouring women, it’s therefore true that, it does not; it thus hinders women effective representation and participation in federal governance.
2.7 The Prospects of Electoral Reform for Nigeria Women Democracy drives from and thrives on the principle that power belongs to the people. The people exercise powers through their elected representatives whose mandates must be subject to periodic renewal on terms dictated by the laws of the land in conformity with conventional democratic principles and practice. Where there are challenges arising from perceived inadequacies of legislations and/or their implementation, a review normally becomes imperative. In this context, the Nigerian reform process has been seen as an opportunity to strengthen mass involvement and participation in the democratic process, by removing existing barriers in 33 such a way that it leads to vast improvements in registration and voting practices; essentially to guarantee the voting rights of all Nigerians and ensure that the people’s vote count. Nigeria operates a weak electoral system that cannot guarantee any form of modern day democracy. Except the 2011 general election which could be rated relatively fair, though not devoid of electoral crisis. The country’s inability to conduct credible elections has been attributed to the long period of military rule, coupled with weak democratic institutions, and processes and host of other historical factors which have led to the emergence of political culture characterized by electoral violence, monetized politics, low political accountability, abuse and personalization of power, general apathy towards election and low participation of critical segments of the society especially women (WARDC, 2011). It is therefore a fact that historical analysis of Nigeria’s Constitutions and Electoral Laws and processes are grossly incontrovertibly gender insensitive. Beginning from 1922, when the First Constitution in Nigeria was made to the present 1999 Constitution, which purportedly gave legitimacy to the Third Republic, aspirations and concerns of women, who represent majority of the population, have been undisputedly discarded, but since the return of civilian rule in 1999, there seem to be a lot of momentums gathered around the need for constitutional and electoral reforms. This development has also challenged women in the country, with several women groups lending their voices to the electoral and constitutional reform discourse. Their active participation is dated back to the first attempt at reviewing the 1999 Constitution by President Olusegun Obasanjo’s Administration in October 1999. When the first Presidential Committee had 24 members out of which 4 were women. The Report submitted by the committee had some gender friendly provisions, to wit; a proposal that the federal character commission be replaced with equal opportunity commission with a more expanded and inclusive mandate; it also proposed that women should have a choice in claiming their own state of origin or their husband’s in political arrangements and the third major amendment proposed by the committee was the substitution of the word “sex” s it refers to the famine in the constitution with the word “gender”. Unfortunately, the report was later jettisoned. Given President Obasanjo’s re-election in 2003, he again convoked a National Political Reform Conference (NPRC) in 2005, to address the challenges of Nigeria’s political system. Unfortunately, in terms of representation, the conference did not attempt to give equal 34 opportunities to all Nigerians. There were only 30 women out of about 400 delegates. Despite the obvious gender gaps in representation of women, the National Political Reform Conference significantly mainstreamed gender issues in its outcomes. Given to series of clamour for effective constitutional and electoral law review, late President Alhaji Umaru Yar’adua on 28 th august 2007 inaugurated another Electoral Reform Committee on attempt to address some of the pertinent issues of Nigeria’s electoral democracy. The committee headed by retired chief justice of the federation, justice Muhammed Bello Uwais made gender sensitive recommendations such as- 1) Independent National Electoral Commission’s Chairman and Deputy Chairman should not be of the same gender and out of 6 geo-graphical representations, 2 must be women. In addition, there should be a woman representative from the women’s organization. 2) On Political Party’s Registration and Regulatory Commission, the ERC recommended that, 2 out of 6 persons from the geo-political zonal representatives must be women, and also that political associations should maintain 20% women in the membership of its governing bodies. 3) On enhancing internal democracy in the political parties: political parties should give more attention to the nomination of women and youths as candidates and ensure that women have equal access to leadership opportunities within party organizations. The Report further recommended that, political parties shall nominate for the proportional representation at least, 30% female candidates and 2% physically challenged candidates for legislative elections. These gender friendly recommendations would have advanced the place of Nigeria women in the political circle of the country, but unfortunately, the Electoral Reform Committee’s Reports (ERC) was still not implemented, as the National Assembly passed the 2010 Electoral Law and did conclude the Constitutional Review. However, the only probable gender friendly proposal by National Assembly was the new clause allowing for independent candidacy which was later thrown out by state houses of assembly. This development shows the failure of the Nigerian State once again to put a legal framework in place to support a gender friendly electoral system. Hence, women have no prospect of equal representation under this insensitive electoral laws and constitution.
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2.8 Conceptual issues: Gender Sensitivity, Sustainable Development and the Effects on Affirmative Action Since the inception of the current Nigerians Nascent Democracy on 29 th May 1999, series of approaches, policies and projects have surfaced in the country with the objective to combat the threat of gender along the pathways to socio-economic and political development. Women on their path have championed several gender sensitive projects within the country’s socio-cultural, educational, economic and political terrains. The emerging gender oriented movements signaled a new dawn in the history for Nigeria’s capacity building, gender issues and sustainable development (Mba, 1997). As pathway to development, various efforts have been steered by governmental and non- governmental bodies with the objective of arresting gender-blind policies, Planning, programmes and projects. However, as a matter of explanation of the gender concept, Snyder and Tadesse (1995:14), conceived gender as “a social construct that asserts that the expectations and responsibilities of men and women are not always biologically determined, but also cultural principles and practices”. They posted that gender as a concept easily accommodates race, class, and ethnicity.
Gender refers to socially constructed roles of women and men ascribed to them on the basis of their sex, whereas the term sex refers to biological and physical characteristics (UN, 1999). According to the UN World Survey on the Role of Women in Development (1999b), she refered to gender as the social meaning given to biological sex differences as well the ideological and cultural construct’ that is also reflected in influencing material practices. The UN (1999a) further asserts that gender is a social stratifier, and in this sense it is similar to other stratifies such as a race, class, ethnicity, sexuality and age. According to Udegbe (1999:3) gender is “a stimulus that frames expectations, evaluations and response patterns of individuals”.
However, as noted by Isamah (2002:123), “development is the quantitative and qualitative transformation of societies from one stage to another”. According to him, development process has its overriding objectives as the enhancement of the quality of people’s lives and livelihoods. In this context, development refers to gradual evolvement and advancement of all socio-cultural, political, economic and other institutional spheres of society for the benefit of humanity. As noted by Okafor and Abdulazeez (2007), they postulated that 36 male-female relationship and its theory span from household to the international economy. Development exists within the framework of human thoughts as a relative reality, multifaceted and down to earth social processes of life.
Development’s area of coverage is comprehensive for spanning from individual, family kinship, lineage, and community society to global levels. As observed by Olutayo and Bankole (2002; 119), “development involves process of change upon socio-political environment of society that is, what is central to the development of any nation is the availability of means and forces of production which are owned by the indigenous members of the society and who control the use of these means”. As opined by Rodney (1972:92), “development in human society is many sided processes”. In line with this emerged Nigeria’s five main national development objectives.
According to the Second National Development Plan (1970-74), the country aims to build; a free and democratic society, a just and egalitarian society, a united, strong and self reliant nation, a great and dynamic economy and a land of bright and full opportunities for all citizens (Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1970). The above goals of the National Development Plan presuppose that human development is all embracing and pervasive as it welcomes contributions of every diverse element in the country without mincing matter on sexual differences in role allocation, and role performances.
The phenomenon of sustainable development has gone beyond the shores of women centered movement. Realization of development especially, sustainable development through gender initiatives also lurked behind objective verification and assessment of all local varieties of social and human stratification such age, caste, class, culture education ethnicity, race, sexuality, religion among others (Akerkari, 2001).
Definition of sustainable development is highly demanding at this juncture. Therefore, according to WCED (1987:43), “sustainable development is the development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. It further states that sustainable development requires meeting the basic needs of all and extending to all the opportunity to satisfy their aspirations for a better life. Drawing from the above, Adams (1990) in Mitlin, (1992) sees sustainable development as intensely synthetic 37 concept whose second characteristics, is the apparent ease with which different ideas about development are grafted on.
Braidotti, Charkiewiez, Hausler, and Wieringa (1995:133) argued that:
any definition of sustainable development depends, of course, upon the definition of development, and what it is that is to be sustained, that is, the continued high level of consumptions or the fulfillment of basic needs. Meanwhile, as noted by Chambers (1987), he viewed it as ensuring of sustainable live hoods for all people including women and children. To him bottom-up model is central to the sustainability of development. Basically, sustainable development entails building upon the past for better present without jeopardizing brighter best future. Inferring from this, every emerging element of gender sensitive policy stands too greatly or lightly, directly or indirectly instill social change for sustainable human development, therefore ‘genderism’ is to gender, what ageism, ethno-centrism, racism, sexism, is to age, ethnic group, race and sex. Therefore, to ensure sustainable development in Nigeria, there is need to install adequate empowerment strategies and gender sensitive policies and projects.
In reference to women, Braidotti, Charkiewiez, Hausler and Wieringa (1995:145), contended that empowerment entails according people, especially women strategic opportunity to access and control their bodies and resources towards environmental and sustainable development. They further stated that; women’s empowerment is seen as a cost-effective strategy to achieve sustainable development, not as an end in itself on-women’s own terms.
According to Garba (1997:247), “social, cultural, economic and historical processes often undermined Nigeria women’s empowerment slots in the stage of development”. She argues that in Nigeria as in many parts of the world, women do not enjoy the same privilege, opportunities, power, influence and recognition, as men. Not until then, exogenous empowerment emphasizes all interest holders in social phenomenon to participate and subsequently influence decision making process as it affects their likes consciously and unconsciously. This supports the idea of external individuals and groups influencing the empowerment of disempowered people along the corridor of sustainable development. 38
On the contrary, exogenous empowerment expresses capability building activity among disempowered beings with the view to prepare them for full-fledged participation in decision making and implementation processes of development. It presupposes that external individuals and groups stand to facilitate disempowered people by fortifying them with the necessary mechanics required for empowerment tussles. It is on this note that, haven seen the gap in the participatory level of both genders in Nigeria federal governance, that government instituted some affirmatives action to bridge the gross lacuna. She hence, deemed it necessary to give gender sensitivity a crucial place in her federal affirmative action since 1999, if government’s goal of national sustainable development must be achieved.
Among other affirmatives action of federal government of Nigeria towards enhancing gender sensitivity in federal governance is the endorsement of National Gender Policy in 2006. Which its main thrust is to promotes gender-sensitive and gender responsive culture in policy planning and national developments. The framework is equally anchored on gender equality principles, and a process in which women’s roles in reproduction and production are not only valued, but are seen as the core of the nation’s wealth upon which national development is anchored.
Transforming the Nigerian society must be informed by the truism-‘a nation that is not engendered is endangered’, while the ‘gender variable’ needs to occupy a central state in national development. A gender sensitive government augurs well for sustainable development which entails a holistic transformation of the state. This is because, human resource stands out as the major factor that determines the manner or pace in which all other factors would be combined to spur the development process. This was aptly recognized by UNDP (1997), which noted that, the people (men and women) are the real wealth of a nation and that the basic objectives of development is to create an enabling environment for people (men and women) to enjoy long, healthy, and creative lives.
However, several international conferences on women have also been held, some of which include: Mexico (1975), Copenhagen (1980), Nairobi (1985), and Beijing (1995) all of which emphasized that, the involvement and reorganization of women and their activities in the society would enhance development advancement. At these conferences, governments agreed among themselves to identify and address key areas that blocked the advancement of women. 39
2.9 Evaluation of the Goals of Affirmative Actions Since 1999 According to Adegoroye (2005:7), “the primary governance tool for integrating gender into development planning and sustainable national development is the 1999 Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria”. The Constitution, under Chapter 2; Fundamental Objective and Directive Principles of State Policy particularly the political, economic, social and education objectives of the state forbids any form of discrimination against women. The rights of women under the constitution are complemented by series of other global initiatives and national effects aimed at building a just, rational, open and equitable society where women are not only recognized but only also give their right dues as co-partners in the development process. Some of the global, regional, sub-regional and national initiatives which Nigeria has either acceded to or integrated their relevant provisions into sectoral policies impinging on the welfare of women include: i. The African Charter on Human and People’s Right ii. The United Nations Convention on Elimination Of All Forms Of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAN) which was signed in 1985 and ratified in 1999 iii. Declaration of the 1993 World Conference on Human Rights Held in Vienna which articulated and unequivocally defined women’s rights iv. Declaration of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) v. The 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action vi. The ECOWAS Gender Policy vii. National Policy on Women. viii. The National Economic Empowerment And Development Strategy (NEED) ix. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGS). x. The establishment of Nigerian Quota And Zoning System xi. The establishment of Nigerian Ministry Of Women Affairs xii. The creation of Nigeria Federal Character Commission
In pursuit of Nigeria’s national development, its pride and place among the comity of nations, Nigeria therefore needs to critically review, for proper implementation of her subscription to the Millennium Declaration of 2000, and her commitment to the realization of the 40
MDGS including goal #3 which laid to rest the hither to argument that leadership and decision making is an exclusive gender role assigned to men. The meritorious performance of countless women as leaders and decision makers in households, communities and in the public and private sphere have further confirmed that the social construction and proper perception of gender roles is indeed, a barrier to the realization of women’s full potentials in every field of endeavor in Nigeria.
By its manifest commitment to the realization of the MDGS, including the goals for gender equality and women’s empowerment, the government of Nigeria has overtly demonstrated its obligation to support women’s consistently valid demands for an expansion of the political space to allow for the meaningful participation of more women. The National Gender Policy endorsed by the Federal Executive Council in 2006 gave additional impetus for replicate sub-sector policies and affirmations that aim to increase women’s political empowerment.
The Government of Nigeria is said to be committed to building a nation devoid of gender discrimination, guarantee equal access to political, social and economic wealth creation opportunities for women and men. It is for this cause that the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development was created in 2000 to serve as a national vehicle to bring about speedy and healthy development processes and to ensure the survival, protection, development and participation of all. In further to attain this goal of building a nation devoid of gender, discrimination, Nigeria as a member of un has equally signed and ratified various relevant international instruments, treaties, and conventions without reservation. These instruments have always emphasized that member nations should put in place all necessary mechanisms needed to eliminate gender discriminations, ensure equality and human dignity to all men and women. Government has also put in place policy like the National Gender Policy (2006), which was aligned with relevant regional and international protocols and instruments such as the Beijing Platform For Action (BPFA), New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD), AU Solemn Declaration for Gender Equality, African Protocol on People’s Rights and The Rights Of Women (APPRRW), The Convention On The Elimination Of All Forms Of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), International Conference On Population Development Plan Of Action (ICPA POA), And The Millennium Development Goals (MDGS). 41
Irrespective of the signed and ratification of these various relevant international instruments, treaties and conventions without reservation, yet there still persist discrimination in national and state status. Traditions, customs, sexual stereotyping of social roles and cultural prejudice has continued to militate against enjoyment of rights and full participation of women on an equal basis with men in national development (Inna, 2006).
In bid re-direct the country to the path of sustainable development; Former President Olusengu Obasanjo championed two complementary initiatives in his administration namely; the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) and The National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (SEED). According to Adegoroye (2005:8-12), “the core concern of NEPA in terms of its goals and strategic focus, have been factored into the National Economic Empowerment Development Strategy (NEED), which under needs, the government of Nigeria is said to be committed to the empowerment of women through adoption of some measures like: ensure equitable representation of women all over the country in all aspects of national life by using affirmative action to enhance that women represent at least 30% of the workforce where feasible, and to implement the provisions of discrimination against women among other measures”.
African governments have responded positively to the burden of under-development by instituting continent-specific development goals and strategies while also recognizing the firm commitment to gender equality as the bait to be development. These were expressed in the African Charter of Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR), adopted in 1981 and its Women’s Rights Protocol Of 2003, The ECOWAS Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance, 2001, and The New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) Adopted In July 2001. These initiatives are linked with other international agreements, and especially the MDGS.
The above notwithstanding, the history of development policies in Nigeria has been that of a general neglect of the gender variable. The first twenty years of development planning in Nigeria as a republic remained largely ‘welfarist’ whereby gender concerns and women’s interests were subsumed within the national interest, and a trickle down approach to development practice. Under such method, polices remained gender-blind, thus was never an issue of development planning. 42
Nigeria embraced gender biased economic policies since of decades of 1980s by pursuing economic growth through structural adjustment and broad liberalization policies. This made up short term marked reforms and liberalization of all key sectors of the economy. The World Bank Poverty Reduction Strategies have been broadly accepted and, although Nigeria has exited the strangle-hold of debt crises and enforced liberalization, by virtue of substantial debt forgiveness and unprecedented foreign reserve, the extant macroeconomic development framework Nigeria Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) was equally fashioned, to achieve poverty reduction by subscribing to pro-liberalization policy framework.
Need is a medium term plan mapped to address poverty and achieve sustainable growth. It is not limited to macroeconomic policy but extends to critical social, policy and cultural problems that have short changed Nigeria immense growth and development potentials, of which gender issues are subsumed within the letters. Ostensibly therefore, needs claims to address gender inequality lies within this framework. The more visible aspects of needs may therefore be said to be those reforms that reflect more of gender bias than gender sensitivity. With the introduction of MDGS more vigorous global and national attentions are now drawn to pursuing gender sensitive polices. Goal 3 of the MDGS, aimed at achieving gender equality and women’s empowerment (Inna, 2006).
As opined by Irabor (2012), Section 40 of the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria provides for the right of every Nigerian to participate in public life. Complementing this, Nigeria on 23 April 1984 signed CEDAW and ratified it on 13 June 1985 as it was adopted by UN General Assembly on 18 December 1979. Nigeria also participated in the World Conference on Women (the Beijing Conference) in 1995. She believed there was nothing in the constitution that excludes the participation of women in Nigeria politics, yet her women remain largely under- represented in politics in comparison to their male counterparts.
The Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) of Nigeria also affirmed in its amended 2011 Constitution Section 1 (6) (9) that “in nomination for party offices, not less than 35% shall be reserved for women”. Irrespective of the said support for 35% affirmative action, there still exists the challenge of implementing this action. Given the gross disparities between men and women, there arose great advocacy agitation championed by some First Ladies, Late Mrs. Miriam Babangida was arguably the First Nigerian First Lady who really brought women issues to the 43 front burner of Nigerian social political consciousness, when her husband was the Head of State in 1995.her Better Life for rural women pet project gave women voice in the male dominated environment. Mrs. Miriam Abacha during the reign of her husband too came up with the Family Support Programme (FSP), which championed the cause of women advocacy but was limited within collective family units rather than the socio-political emancipation which they craved. Mrs. Titi Abubakar came with her own Women Rights Project (WRAPPER), which was short lived as her husband Gen. Abdulsalam Abubakar handed over power to a civilian administration after ten months. President Olusegun Obasanjo came on board with his now Late Wife Stella Obasanjo when Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999 and with democracy came the full decentralization of women advocacy with every first lady in the various states setting up their own pet projects, and involving the wives of Council Chairmen and other top women in the states and all the local government areas of their states. Most of these women later became the vanguard of the numerous women movements in the political space and women’s wing in the major political parties. Prior to April 2011 general election in Nigeria, the country’s first lady and wife of the President, Dame Patience Jonathan initiated a project aimed at achieving 35% representation for women in all the States and Federal Government. The Project, Women for Change Initiative was formed to seek the consent and endorsement of all of the State Governors across the 36 States of the country to ensure that they grant women the benchmark of 35% participation and reservation in the occupation of elected offices and in their state administrative cabinets. The Initiative attracted vibrant advocacy especially in the political campaigns that ushered in the 2011 April polls, and it eventually became a very laudable campaign, which even the president and all the governors gave their full consent, all of which contributed tremendously to the unprecedented participation and involvement of women in the election process in 2011. But when the election proper was conducted and the results announced, it became clear that the campaign for women participation in politics had not yielded too much anticipated dividends. The outcome of the polls, according to women pressure groups and gender activists, revealed that women were yet to be fully integrated into the highly charged atmosphere of partisan and elective politics (Abuah, 2012).
Notwithstanding the said domestication of International Conventions and Protocols and several other projects initiated by the government of Nigeria as including those championed by former and present first ladies in the country, a vital representation assessments of women in 44 politics since 1999, has shown that, According to Abuah (2012), there was a sudden downward curve in the April 2011 election, when ever in spite of the 35% affirmative action campaign, women contested for elective position but the number of winners was disturbingly less than in the previous polls.
A breakdown of the April 2011 election results shows that out of 109 senators elected across the 36 states, only 7 women were elected, hence accounting for pathetic represented of 6.42%. 2007 election had 9 women senators (3.67%) while 1999 election had 3 female senators representing 2. 75% of the total figure. This same pattern was replicated in the house of representative where the figures have fluctuated over the years. For example, only 19 women won election into the house out of the 360 members of the lower chamber which represents 5.27% in the April 2011 polls. 2007 election gave 27seats (7.5%) to women and 21 seats (5.8%) in 2003. In 1999, women had 12 seats in the House which equals 3.3%.
Table 2: Levels of Women Representation in Upper and Lower House between1999-2011
Women Representation In Senate (109) Year 2011 2007 2003 1999 Number 7 9 4 3 Percentage 6.42% 8.25% 3.67% 2.75% Women Representation In House of rep (360) Year 2011 2007 2003 1999 Number 19 27 21 12 Percentage 5.27% 7.5% 5.8% 3.3% Source: Abuah (2012), Change is coming: Nigeria Women set to Achieve 35% Representation. www.africaundisguised.com/newsporta. From the above analysis, it could be seen that the figures and percentages confirm that the goal of federal affirmative action of enhancing adequate representation of women in federal governance is yet unachieved. As pointed by Abuah (2012), he affirmed that women are still a very long way afar from achieving the 35% political recognition in the electoral space of Nigeria. Another area portraying the gap in gender representation in federal governance is seen in the act of political parties, as none of the over 60 political parties could nominate single female presidential candidates. Also no woman has from 1999 till date elected a vice president, the 45 senate president or the deputy senate president. In 2007, a woman Mrs. Patricia Etteh was elected the speaker of house of representative, but succumbed to the wily machinations of political intrigues when she became a victim of the high wire end game for parliamentary power and was implicated in the controversy surrounding the rehabilitation of the speaker’s residence. Since then, no other women have occupied the post, which clearly depicts the gender disparities in representation of women in Nigerian federal governance. Therefore, there are gender sensitive policies targeted at achieving the goals of federal affirmative action since 1999 such as; to achieve minimum threshold of representation for women in order to promote equal opportunity in all areas of political, social, economic life of the country for women, as well as men could be said to have been unattained (Abuah, 2012).
2.10 Gaps in Literature
Common to all literature is the lack of explanation on the politics of none enforcement of gender related federal affirmatives action by our male dominated government, of which proper implementation of gender sensitive policies would shrink the political and social domineering place of men in our society. The rationale is that, lack of sincere legislation gives room for non- implementation of even the best policies. However, irrespective of the introduction of affirmative action in Nigeria, women are not yet being carried along, as affirmative action in Nigeria ignored women issues.
Thus, all the study by commission or omission failed to highlight this politics, and its implication on enhancing true gender sensitive policies in Nigerian federal governance. However, irrespective of the fact that, National Policy on Women called for at least 30% representation of women in public offices, the Nigerian government has not deemed it necessary to put necessary machineries in place to implement and actualize that. This is despite efforts being made by our sister African countries to bridge the gap between men and women in politics. For instance, while Rwanda has 48.8% of women in their National Parliament, Nigeria has only 6.7%; Tanzania has 22.3%, Uganda 24.7%, South Africa 29.8% and Mozambique 30.0%. From these examples there is no doubt that Nigeria is ranking very low in terms of women representation in the parliament (Okumephuna, 2009). 46
As opined by Okafor and Abdulazeez (2007:236), “Most gender-initiative projects, especially women driven programmes are chasing shadows of social reality at the expense of real social facts and subsequently exalting patriarchy and its attendant consequences. Nevertheless, gender-responsive projects have contributed meaningfully in human development in Nigeria, but its general pattern and process is fluffy”.
As stated by Karl (1995), identified four stages through which empowerment could be effectively enforced, they are; awareness stage, capacity building and skills development stage, participation and greater control in decision making stage, and action for change stage. However, according to Development Alternatives for Women in the New Era (DAWN) mobilization, raising consciousness, and accessibility to resources (land, credit, education and training) are good facilities for empowering oppressed people especially women and poor souls (Sen and Grown, 1987).
As noted by Okafor and Abdulazeez (2007:245) “gender initiatives ought to be perceived, mobilized, funded, supported, treated, monitored and evaluated as holistic scepter for woman development”. This is however, different in the implementation of gender sensitive policies where our male dominated government hide under the umbrella of promoting gender sensitivity in federal governance, hence politicize out the core support, treatment, monitoring and evaluations that are required in the effective enforcement of gender sensitivity in the country.
Government has not equally given much attention to Karl’s (1995) empowerment stage of; participation and greater control in decision making, and the action for change stage. This is to avoid promoting active competition between male and female gender in representation in federal governance. Empowering women politically, economically, socially and culturally entail blowing the dependence bridge on men, which to men would reduce their chances of occupying greater seats in governance, as well as striping off their esteems and socially egos hence, the hidden politics of poor implementation of gender sensitive policies that would enhance effective representation of women in the federal governance is purposefully omitted by the government. And with this trend, achieving gender sensitive policies and goals of federal affirmatives action (in federal governance) remain but a mirage.
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CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Theoretical Framework The most appropriate theory used in the analysis of this study is the Feminist Theory and precisely, Radical Feminism because it is most relevant explanation of women marginalizing from the management of the state and political under-representation. According to Deckard (1979), the central thought of radical feminism can be summarized into the following points: Firstly, women oppression is the first and the most central form of domination by one group over another; they believe that male supremacy is the oldest and most basic form of domination. All other forms of exploitation are extension of male supremacy. Men dominate women; a few men dominate the rest. Secondly, the origin of women’s oppression can be traced biology. The biology made women depend on men for their physical survival. Thirdly, all societies are patriarchal where men’s domination over women is institutionalized through social structures such as the family, marriage, motherhood, love and sexual intercourse and religion. Fourthly, women oppression will no longer exist, not because its biological determinant will be overcome, but when the structures that maintain this oppression are terminated or dismantled by the feminist revolution. The abolition of capitalism and the introduction of socialist society are not sufficient for this revolution, but the elimination of gender discrimination, the integration of women into men’s activities cannot reverse men’s domination. Fifthly, the women are the revolutionary force and cannot expect much from men. Sixthly, for this feminist revolution to take place and a new society to be constructed, women must be free from the tyranny of their reproductive biology. This means that society must work towards complete political and economic independence of women and children. Furthermore, women and children must be totally connected to all aspects of the large society. Lastly, there must be full sexual freedom of both men and children. Theoretical Application On the basis of this assumption, the research proceeded to examine how this theory fit into the explanation of the low level of women participation in politics (federal governance) in Nigeria. As a follow up, it has been argued that women oppression and alienation is the first and 49 most central form of domination of one group over another. It is true that, here in Nigeria, all the existing communities believe that the world is man’s world. Everybody is a member of a family and the family no doubt is the unit on which the communities are built and the nation itself is built by communities. The central point is that, these families in Nigeria are still dominated by men folk. Therefore, the economic activities, political and social as well as cultural activities are being determined by the family in favour of the dominant group (men). The presence of these factors, hinder effective participation of women in politics. The biological factors to some extent could be considered here, this is because, till today women in Nigeria consider themselves weak in all aspect of life including politics, given the fact that the political system in Nigeria is violent in nature and this culture of violent politics scare women from political scene. Due to the absence of peace and stability and the feeling that, they are weak, this happens to the advantage of men who are physically stronger than women. Women themselves by implication have accepted that, they are the weaker sex, therefore are less capable of withstanding challenges and highly responsible jobs. This denied them of so many opportunities in Nigeria and the world at large. The theory also argued that, structures of men domination are institutionalized. Women in Africa including Nigeria have lost their strength unlike in the pre- colonial era. Therefore, to some extent, it is not a function of biological incapability that has hindered Nigerian women from reaching their fullest potentials in political participation and representation rather, cultural barriers. To breakout of these artificial barriers is a problem to Nigerian women. The Report of the Commission on the status of women in Irish society of 1972 agrees with this contention. The report stated that; it is from this type of cultural mould that discrimination arises and it is only by the removal of such traditional attitudes that women can hope to achieve complete self fulfillment and equal participation in all aspect of the communities including politics. This institution for instance, the family etc is still present and there is low level of political participation. It is women that assist fellow women and even men to understand themselves and accept their place in society. With this little awareness, there could be improvement of women participation in politics of Nigeria. The truth is that, women have a great role to play as well as bountiful benefits to reap from participating in Nigeria’s political system. Until they realize this, they will not stand up and fight. The numerical strength of Nigerian women is a strong weapon of revolution, however the inability of women elite and women political wings as well as women 50 in non-governmental organizations (NGOS) to enlighten the women folk most especially those in the rural area whereby the campaign for women empowerment is not adequate has left the women behind. Finally, the theory suggested that, for the feminist revolution to occur, women must be free from the tyranny of their reproductive biology. They should be both politically and economically independent, since these factors are still present or common in Nigeria, the researcher can conclusively state that Nigerian women are not free from the tyranny and alienation of the male folk, and this has been responsible for their low participation and representation in federal governance.
3.2 Hypotheses This study is going to be guided by the under stated hypotheses:
I) Gender sensitivity was considered a significant component of affirmative action since 1999, because the federal government placed women equality over and above national development in its policies. II) The gender sensitivity policy has not achieved the goals of federal affirmative action since 1999.
3.3 Research Design
In this study, we adopted, “One Group: Pre-test, Post- test Design”. This type of design is common in the ex post facto experiment based on survey and aggregate data (Legee and Francis 1974:71). In this case, a single group is compared with itself; this needs a measurement to be taken before and after an experimental variable or causal event has occurred. The difference, if any is attributed to the experimental variables; while a test of significance is commonly used to see beyond what might be obtained by chance.
One Group Pre-test, Post test Design is represented in the form below:
O1 X O2
Where:
O1 = First Observation
X = Experimental Variable 51
O2 =Second Observation
In the above form, O1 stands for the first observation. In our study it was observed that, Gender Sensitivity was considered significant component of Federal Affirmative Action because Federal Government placed women equality over national development in her policies.
X= Gender Sensitivity in Nigerian Federal Governance.
O2= in our second observation, we noted that, gender sensitivity policies have not achieved the goals of federal affirmative action since 1999.
As we have already noted, the difference, if any in the O1 and O2 is attributed to the experimental variables. The adoption of this type of research enables us to identify and address the most sever threats to the validity and reliability of the topic under study.
3.4 Methods of Data Collection
The data for this study would be collected through the use of secondary sources. By secondary sources, we mean data generated or authored by another person. These are usually data collected from periodicals, government reports and publications, articles, journals, conference papers, text books, archives, either in the form of documents, published and unpublished works as well as internet sources to generate data needed to test our hypotheses.
Also, in order to ensure the validity and reliability of our data, we adopted the qualitative method under content analysis. As noted by Festinger and Katz (1968), Content Analysis is Research Technique for objective, systematic and qualitative description of the manifest content of communication. The objective of content analysis is to convert raw phenomena into data which can be treated in essentially scientific manner so that a body of knowledge may be built.
According to Berelson (1952), content analysis is a research tool focused on the actual content and internal features of media. It is used to determine the presence of certain words, concepts, themes, phrases, characters, or sentences within text or sets of texts and to qualify this presence in an objective manner. Texts can be defined broadly as books, books chapters, essays, interviews, discussions, newspaper headlines and articles, historical documents, speeches, conversations or really any occurrence of communicative language. Most of these items, as presented by Berelson (1952), form the body of materials consulted and applied in our analysis. 52
3.5 Methods of Data Analysis
The method to be adopted for the analysis of our data is Qualitative Descriptive Analysis. As noted by Asika (2006:118), he defined Qualitative Descriptive Analysis as “summarizing the information generated in the research verbally so as to further discover relationships among variables”. The adoption of the foregoing analytical method becomes necessary since the study will rely basically on secondary source of data. This technique is also known as Content Analysis. According to Obikeze (1990:81), “this technique was developed as a result of the need for a reliable scientific method for assessing, analyzing and interpreting a large variety of materials”. We therefore, relied majorly (but in no way exclusively) on this analytical technique to evaluate the data generated for this study.
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CHAPTER FOUR: DIMENSIONS OF THE DEBATE ON GENDER AND AFFIRMATIVE ACTION IN NIGERIA
The existence of various views and debates on gender and affirmative action is not limited to Nigeria but has rather become a global phenomenon. The heated debates did not occur in a historical vacuum. Historically therefore, affirmative action is an outgrowth and continuation of united states of American government’s effort to remedy subjugation of racial, ethnic minorities and women’s subjugation in their society hence; some affirmative action efforts began before the great burst of civil rights status in the 1950s and 1960s; but affirmative efforts did not truly take hold until it became clear that anti-discrimination status alone were not enough to break long-standing patterns of discrimination for much of this century, racial and social exclusion. African-Americans and Hispanic-Americans were segregated into low wage jobs, usually agriculture. Asian-Americans, who were forbidden by law from owning land worked fields to which they could not hold title, women were barred by laws in many states from entering entire occupations such as” politics, mining, fire fighting, bar tending, law and medicine. However, the first significant wave of progress in enhancing employment opportunities for African-Americans and women came during the labour shortage of World War II and immediately afterwards, before the use of affirmative action. That notwithstanding, racial separation continued, and African-Americans were still segregated for the most part into low wage jobs into the 1960s. For Hispanic-Americans, employment opportunities remained seriously restricted into the 1970s. While industries and categories of employment were, in effect, all-white, all male. In thousands of towns and cities, police departments and fire departments remained all white and male; women and minorities were forbidden to even apply. (..Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity and Diversity 2009, http://www.uri.edu/affirmative action/aa.html
In grocery and department stores, clerks were white and janitors and elevator operators were black. Generations of African-Americans swept the floors in factories while denied the opportunity to become higher paid operatives on the machines. In businesses such as the canning industry, Asian American were not precluded from becoming mangers, but were housed in physically segregated living quarters. Stereotyping assumptions that women would be only part time or temporary workers resulted in their exclusion from a full 54 range of job opportunities. Newspaper job listings were segregated by gender. Women also confronted other barriers to full inclusion such as low pay and fewer benefits than men even when performing similar jobs; losing their jobs if they married or became pregnant; and sexual harassment on the job. African-Americans, even if they were college-educated worked as bell boys, porkers and domestics, unless they could manage to get a scare teaching position in the all- black schools which was usually the only alternative to preaching, or perhaps working in the post office. Asian Americans and Hispanic Americans on the their part were legally barred from attending some public schools, and women were systematically excluded from some private and state funded colleges, universities, and professional schools well into the 10970s. It is indeed explicit that separation of the races and relegation of women to the sidelines remained the norm for most of this century.
The Civil Right Movement had its dramatic victories in the case between brown and board of education and in some other cases striking down segregation, the Civil Right Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which helped advance the constitution’s promise of equal opportunity to all minorities and women. Even after the passage of the Civil Right Laws beginning in the 1960s, however, the road to equal opportunity for minorities and women was difficult, and programs often very slow. These judicial and legislative victories were not enough to overcome long-entrenched discrimination because in part, these measures frequently focused only on issues of formal rights such as the right to vote, that were particularly susceptible to judicial or statutory resolution. With time wind of change blew endearing the courts, republican and democratic administrations turned to race and gender-conscious remedies as a way to end entrenched discrimination. These remedies were developed after periods of experimentation had shown that other means too failed to correct the problems, for examples in July 1970, a federal district court enjoined the state of Alabama from continuing to discriminate against blacks in the hiring of state troopers. The court stated that, “in the thirty-seven years history of the patrol there has never been a black trooper” the court order included detailed non-numerical provisions for assuring an end to discrimination, such as stringent controls on the civil service certification procedure and an extensive program of recruitment of minority job applicants. Eighteen months later, not a single black had been hired as a state trooper or into a civilian position connected with the troopers. The District Court then entered a further order requiring their hiring of one qualified black trooper or support person applicant for each white hired until 25% of the force 55 was comprised of blacks. By the time the case reached the court of appeals in 1974, 25 black troopers and 80 black support personnel had been hired. The order has affirmed by the U.S Supreme Court. Also, in 1979, women represented only 4% of the entry-level officers in the San Francisco Police Department. By 1985, under an affirmative action plan ordered in a case in which the U.S Department of Justice sued the city for discrimination the number of women in the entry class had risen to 175, or 14.5%. Similarly, a federal district court review of the San Francisco fire Department in 1987 led to a consent decree which increased the number of blacks in officer positions from 7 to 31, Hispanics from 12 to 55, and Asians form 0 to 10, women were admitted as fire fighter for the very first time. For more see; (..Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity and Diversity 2009, http://www.uri.edu/affirmative action/aa.html ).
Given the above background, affirmative action was born out of the civil rights movements three decades ago. It called for monitories and women to be given special consideration in employment, education and contracting decision. Institutions with affirmative action policies generally set goals and timetables for increased diversity.
4.1 Politics of Affirmative Action The term “Affirmative Action” was coined out by President John. F. Kennedy and expand by President Lynden Johnson by the issuing of Executive Order 10925 and Executive Order 11246, which effectively mandated non-discriminatory policies in regards to race, religion, gender and country of origin. Affirmative action programs are created in an attempt to make sure that all groups within a given society have the same opportunity to succeed. It is aimed at ensuring that active steps are taken so that minority groups are represented and hired in organizations, government and businesses. However, instituting an affirmative action as policy comes from a particular assessment of a nation’s past. It is seen as necessary as a compensatory measure in cultures that have a history of discrimination. President Clinton opined that the job of ending discrimination remains unfinished, strongly defended affirmative action, “mend it, but don’t end it” he said. Conservatives however, saw ending affirmative action as a powerful political issue. Heartened by Supreme Court’s decision, that has limited affirmative action, and by the passage in 1996 California Ballot Initiative abolishing sexual and racial preferences, republicans were unhappy, fighting it wherever they can, (Nadra 2001). 56
The debate over affirmative action in USA has a particularly bitter tenor in the trenches. “Angry white men” blamed affirmative action for robbing them of promotions and other opportunities. While many minorities and women supported affirmative action, some people said its benefits are no longer worth its side effects given the perception that their success is unearned. Hence, in Nigeria and in some other countries where clamour for gender affirmative action is prevalence, there exist two different views of affirmative action. While some supported it, the others kicked against affirmative action.
4.2 Arguments for of Affirmative Action In recent years, affirmative action has been debated more intensely than at any other time in its 50year history. Many supporters view affirmative action as a milestone, many opponents see it as a millstone, and many others regard it as both or neither as a necessary, but imperfect, remedy for an intractable social disease. In supporting affirmative action, Luci (2012), however, noted that the highest share of female parliamentarians can be found in the Nordic countries while the lowest share can be found in the Arab states (under 10%), this irrespective of fact that, while women have the legal right to equal participation in politics in almost every country around the world, they remain vastly under-represented in local and national politics. Many countries hence; have introduced some sort of affirmative action policies for women in public offices like gender mainstreaming programs. In some developed countries, women’s influences are far from making up half of the parliamentarians. For instance in France, there are only 18% of women in National Assembly among others, therefore, in order to dismantle this trend the issue of quota system came in, hence the question became, can gender quota in parliaments increase women’s participation in politics? In response to this, Esther Duflo, a Professor of Economics at MIT noted, there were many prejudices against women, but these perceptions change when political quotas impose re-thinking: people find that female politicians are less corrupt and invest more in public goods. In every election in India, one-third of the villages are made to elect a woman mayor by rotation. People have a limited choice in the first election, but an observation showed that they become more likely to elect a woman in the following elections even when they are not constrained. This implied that, they have more ambitions for their daughters and women have more ambition for themselves. He therefore supported quotas as a good thing. He further stated that: people were stuck in their prejudices, 57 they do not know, and do not image women can be good leaders. In the light of his experience, he observed that the same discourse was not perceived in an identical way if uttered by a man or a woman, but this bias disappeared after five years of his experimentation. It is therefore necessary to force people to experience it. Together with her colleagues Lori Beaman, Raghab Chattopadhyay, Rohini Pande and Petia Topalova, Esther Duflo noted further that; one reason to expect quota to have long-term impact on the electoral outcomes for women is by forcing voters to observe women in political leadership positions. If women on average perform better than anticipated by voters, then voters will be more willing to elect women candidates in future elections, even in the absence of quota (Luci ,2012). Work in social psychology suggested that group stereotypes affect individual perceptions of the effectiveness of women as leaders. In the field of politics, it suggested that pre-existing social norms that associate leadership with men make it harder for women to enter the political arena. The lack of exposure to female leaders in turn, perpetuated biased perceptions of female leader effectiveness. Regardless of competence, if women leaders are presumed to be ineffective, their chance of successfully participating in politics would be slim. The experience in India showed that there exist an already evidence that female leaders make different policy choices once in office, especially one that better reflect women’s preferences. Hence, gender quotas in politics, by giving voters the ability to observe the effectiveness of women leaders, can pave the way for improving women’s access to political office and reducing statistical discrimination.
The introduction of affirmative action in USA has had its greatest amount of success in city, state and government jobs. Since the 1960s the area of law enforcement witnessed the greatest increase in minority applicants, and in jobs offered to minorities. This also, is a positive achievement credited to affirmative action, because prior to affirmative action, these jobs were almost completely closed off to minorities and women.
In affirmation, Economists of the University of Innsbruck supported the notion on interventions to promote women. This was given due to their results of series experiments which examined the efficiency and effects of various interventions to increase women’s willingness to enter competition. According to Professor Matthias Sutter of Department of Public Finance of University of Innsbruck “many economic studies provided evidence that women tend to opt out of participating in competition even when they are equally or even better qualified than their 58 male colleagues”, hence he with his colleague Loukas Balafoutas conducted a laboratory experiment with 360 undergraduate students on women’s and men’s immediate reaction to various interventions and how their implementation affects subsequent coordination and team work. In the multi stage experiment, the subjects according to them were randomly assigned into groups of six each consisting of three men and women. The task of the subjects was to add as many sets of five two-digit numbers as possible within a time frame work of three minute. The subjects had to choose whether they wanted to be paid for each correct calculation or to receive three times as much per correct calculation if they chose the competitive scheme and were part of the two best performing competitors. Hence, Balafoutas and Sutter examined five different competition treatments: in one treatment gender was not taken into account. The second treatment corresponded into a minimum quota regulation, often used in public institutions, where there had to be at least one woman among the two winners. In the third treatment, women receive preferential treatment and automatically received an additional point (Science Daily, 2012).
In the fourth treatment, women were strongly favoured by two additional points. Treatments allowed for a repetition of the competition in the case that no woman was among the two winners. Sutter summed up the main results of the experiment: “without intervention the number of women willing to compete was only half the number of men. In three of the other four treatments the frequency of competing women is significantly higher, whereas there was no significant effect for men”. The option of repeating the competition was the only treatment that had no significant effect on women’s entry choices. The frequency of women opting to enter competition was particularly high when they were strongly favoured. The most exciting result of the experiment was that, all in all, overall performance did not suffer. Of course, we deducted the additional points from the average performance of the winners and we found that the female winners were qualified enough so that without the additional points they would have performed better or at least as well as their male colleagues, explained Sutter. The results of this stage suggested that interventions to support women do indeed have a positive effect, in particular with regard to most highly qualified women, (Science Daily, 2012).
In support of affirmative action as opined by Dontingney (2010), affirmative action policies help to create a more diverse work environment. Diversity in turn, provides businesses 59 with two key advantages namely; they provide more adaptability in terms of problem solving by offering a wider array of possible solutions; and companies that embrace a multi cultural employees roster are better positioned to serve multi-cultural communities, by overcoming language and cultural barriers. Equally by maintaining affirmative action hiring policies, a business can expand its opportunities to include government contacts because the Executive Order put in place by President Lyndon. B. Johnson specified that businesses receiving government contracts must establish and maintain affirmative action policies. He also maintained that it brings moral commitment, as embracing affirmative action can provide businesses with a means of making a moral commitment to the ideal of justice or equal treatment for all. The advantage of such a moral stand within the workplace remains indirect. It can help to draw employees that share a belief in the principle of justice, which helps to foster a more tolerant work environment. It can also reassure employees that come from historically underrepresented groups that the company will give them full consideration for any available promotions.
In support of affirmative action, the World Bank (2012) supports gender equality as its MDG’S Goals 3, is to promote gender equality and empower women. She stated that gender equality is a key to achieving the MDGS. According to its report, countries that invest in promoting the social and economic status of women tend to have lower poverty rates. For example, an extra year of secondary schooling for girls can increase their future wages by 10 to 20%. By 2006, 51% of all assistance to the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s Fund for the poorest countries, included gender in project operations. In 2007, the World Bank launched the Gender Action Plan (GAP) to focus on gender in the land, labour, agriculture, finance, and infrastructural sectors. Hence, sixty-three percent of gap initiatives are carried out in IDA countries amounting to $29.9 million. By June 2010, GAP was funding activities in 44 IDA countries.
As highlighted by the report, IDA is helping to achieve MDG 3 by investing in girls’ education, resulting in a 9% increase in girls’ primary school completion from 1999 to 2008. This has not failed in producing positive results. For example, in Bangladesh, gender parity in primary and secondary education has been achieved, along with a sharp increase in the secondary certificate pass rate for girls from 39% in 2001 to 63% in 2008. In Madagascar, women’s membership in microfinance networks increased from 15% in 1999 to 60
45% in 2006. In Senegal, sustainable forestry earns about $ 12.5 million/year, with women driving one-third of this performance. Equally, CEDAW have played a great role in ensuring that rights of women are protected. In Nigeria, government has recognized the need to empower women educationally through valuable re-orientation of parents in order to ensure equal opportunity for the girl child. Also, statistics have shown that about 84% of girls now enjoy equal chance of education as their male counterpart which is an indication that gender disparity in primary and secondary schools can be eliminated in the near future (Abubarka, 2012).
It should in this light be seen that, the days are gone when Nigerian women were confined to the homes, just to attend to domestic chores and bear children. Gone are the days when Nigerian women because of their gentle, subtle, reserved and soft nature were regarded as weak sex that should be seen and not to be heard, that should be used for any purpose at any point in time by men. Gone are the days when women participated in campaign rallies and voter’s registration exercise only to be schemed out when it was elective or appointment time. Gone are the times when they were exploited, marginalized and discriminated against in political process.
The place of women is indispensable in our society. The roles of great women like Queen Amina, Moremi of Ife, Chief (Mrs.) Olufumilayo Ransom Kuti, Mrs. Janet Mokelu and the rest of other prominent and zealous women leaders, in the emancipation of women cannot be overemphasized. Today, Nigeria is blessed with dedicated and outstanding women who have distinguished themselves in their various fields of endeavour namely; Sarah Ajanaku, Professor Dora Akunyili, Sara Jubril, Professor (Mrs.) Ngozi Okonjo Iweala, Mrs. Oby Ezekwesili among others.
How come in a country where women make up more than 2/3 of the country’s 70% adult non- literate population, they hold less than 5% of the important decision making position? Women have in abundance all it takes to occupy leadership positions and are known to play vital roles as organizers, stabilizers, social and political activities yet the society has not given adequate recognition rather they are discriminated against and also turned target of violence. The First Lady, and Wife of President, Dame Patience Jonathan noted that unless the National Assembly realizes that Nigeria is a signatory to the law on discrimination against women and implement the 35% affirmative action, gender inequality would continue to be the order of the 61 day. In a similar occasion, the wife of the former governor of Imo State, Mrs. Chioma Ohakim opined that; when Nigerians acknowledge that women have been left behind Nigerians will accept that it has not been to totally of their own making. The reversal of women’s predicament is inevitably the responsibility of every Nigerian woman (Olebara, 2012).
However, in support of affirmative action, government at levels should develop and support leadership training programmes for women especially young one enable them exercise responsibilities at levels. Government equally should design a political framework that will ensure that a certain percentage of positions are reserved for women as it is done in some other developed and developing nations of the world. The Nigerian National Assembly should as a matter of urgency pass the bill for the implementation of the national gender policy on 35% of affirmative action and ensure that no form of discrimination should be allowed in the country.
4.3 Arguments against Affirmative Action It has been debated that outside the fact that, laws which purportedly benefited women reinforced the stereotype that women are needier, weaker and less competent, it has equally been argued that, gender-based affirmative action creates hostility. This in the sense that, the increase in sexual harassment in the workplace is at least partially attributable to affirmative action programs that permitted women to enter male dominated professions. Affirmative action were also said to caused resentment and anger to males who are increasingly losing their jobs to women, especially women whom they viewed as less qualified and there only because of affirmative action. It is also argued that gender-based preferences have the destructive effect of in most cases pitting the interests of wives against husbands and brothers against sisters. (Rosalie, 2010). The critics of affirmative action opined that, it causes laziness and poor motivation which occur as effects of pampering and in turn build a world of tension and resentment among the groups. As pointed out by Igwe (2007), affirmative action is a policy, usually springing out of a sense of collective responsibility and, sometimes also guilt, and so, intended to redress past injustices imposed by society or its governments upon sections of the populations. However, he noted that care is necessary, for it is not always politics to rekindle ugly memories in such gestures of conciliation. That notwithstanding, affirmative action had 62 generated heated debates in various societies: either that; they are too little too late, or too much too hastily; that they are a reverse discrimination either punishing innocent generations who are made to pay for their ancestor’s misdeeds or enable the beneficiaries profit from other’s past sorrows; that they encourage laziness and mediocrity at the expense of hard work and just rewards, excellence and meritocracy; that those policies are really intended to, and actually do result into under developing same groups under the pretext of assisting them; that they merely touch at the super-structural levels of discrimination, leaving the foundations intact; and that they seem to be unending. When weighing the costs against the benefits of affirmative action, there will be equally the controversial question of how effective it has been. As some scholars opined that, women were the primary beneficiaries of affirmative action, while others view rejected the notion, arguing that “the actual results of affirmative action for women believe the rhetoric (Blum, 1991). On this dimension of debate on gender and affirmative action, some has criticized affirmative action for gender viewing it as reversed discrimination among others. According to Dontigney (2010), irrespective of the fact that affirmative action makes for unity in diversity, increase opportunities and moral commitment, it also has negative aspect as; one major disadvantage of affirmative action is the reality or perception of reverse discrimination. In essence, it is believed that affirmative action programs penalize those from the historically dominant group even when they possess the appropriate qualifications for a given position.
Also, affirmative action policies can potentially create a stigma that minorities and women obtain positions based on gender, race or ethnicity rather than through achievement and qualifications. Hence, this stigma can translate into questioning the competence of minority and women employees to do their jobs. The stigmatization may also lead minority and women employees to question why an employer chose to hire them.
In analyzing specific effects of affirmative action policies on India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Nigeria, it was pointed out by Sowell (2004), that such policies have at best a negligible impact on the group they are intended to assist. Among the common consequences of preference policies in the five country sample are: they encourage non-preferred groups to re-designate themselves as members of preferred groups; to take advantage of group preference policies; they 63 tend to benefits primarily the most fortunate among the preferred group often to the detriment of the least fortunate among the non preferred groups; they reduce the inactive of both the preferred and non- preferred to perform at their best, the former because doing so is unnecessary and the latter because it can prove futile thereby resulting net losses for society as a who le. In the light of the above, Sowell concluded: that, despites sweeping claims made for affirmative action programs, an examination of their actual consequences make it hard to support those claims, or even to say that those programs have been beneficial on net balance. Affirmative action is a compromise, it does not please everybody and it is far from perfect.
Affirmative action is said to use reverse discrimination to solve the problem of discrimination. Also now that the minority benefit from affirmative action, it therefore makes for the favouring of less qualified among the qualified. The critics of affirmative action point out that selecting someone purely based on their ethnicity, gender or origin actually devalues the person’s real accomplishments; According to Dodenholf (2010), public policies can be evaluated in terms of intent, outcome and message. One intent of the laws court cases and executive orders that created affirmative action was sound in order to give women and minorities access to educational and occupational opportunities that previously had been deprived from them, given to either their present discrimination or the present effect of past discrimination.
The results of both public and private affirmative action programs have been mixed, probably negative on balance. Such programs have increased significantly the numbers of women and minorities in positions of influence of academia, government and the private sector. This is generally good, but in higher education, at least, affirmative action has resulted in admission of students who perform substantially worse according to objective criteria than those admitted without affirmative action.
Also, because affirmative action create winners and losers, it therefore breeds resentment between while and blacks, women and men hence, whites and men who have been denied a given position cannot help but wonder if the outcome would have been different in the absence of race and gender based policies. Naturally, they begin to resent the individuals and groups they perceive to benefit from such policies. The beneficiaries of affirmative action in turn resent the assumption that they would not have gotten the desired position were it not for their race or gender. Thus many organizations while more intergraded than ever, are also beset by frustration, 64 resentments and suspicious that simmers just below the surface of apparently polite race and gender relations.
Furthermore, affirmative action policies as noted by Dodenhoff (2010) conveyed a number of destructive messages about individual advancement, equality and inequality. Affirmative action encourages employers to consider race and gender in deciding which candidate are most suited for a position. In so doing, it condones an idea that public policy ought to condemn that is, that individual worth depends in part on racial, gender and ethnic identities. It also treats as legitimate the preposition that historically victimized groups can and should seek recompense from individuals who had no hand in the victimization. And it implies, most unfortunately, that women and minorities cannot achieve a desired level of success unless they receive special considerations from employers, admission committees and their government.
4.4 Evaluation of Both Sides of Debate on Gender Affirmative Action In recent years, affirmative action has been debated more intensely than at any other time in its 50-year history. Many supporters view affirmative action as a milestone, many opponents see it as a millstone, and many others regard it as both or neither as a necessary, but weak and imperfect, remedy for an intractable social disease. In an argument against affirmative action, this school believes affirmative action has not succeeded in increasing female and minority representation. Several studies have documented important gains in racial and gender equality as a direct result of affirmative action (Bowen and Bok, 1998; Murr ell and Jones, 1996). For example, According to U.S. Labor Department, affirmative action has helped 5 million minority members and 6 million white and minority women move up in the workforce ("Reverse Discrimination," 1995). Likewise, a study sponsored by the office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs showed that between 1974 and 1980 federal contractors (who were required to adopt affirmative action goals) added black and female officials and managers at twice the rate of non-contractors (Citizens' Commission, 1984). In opposing the view that affirmative action tends to undermine the self-esteem of women, affirmative action although may have this effect in some cases but not always (Heilman, Simon, and Repper, 1987; Steele, 1990), interview studies and public opinion surveys suggested that such reactions were rare (Taylor, 1994). For instance, a 1995 Gallup poll asked employed blacks and employed white women whether they had ever felt others questioned their 65 abilities because of affirmative action (Roper Center for Public Opinion, 1995c). Nearly 90% of respondents said no (which is understandable after all, white men, who have traditionally benefited from preferential hiring, do not feel hampered by self-doubt or a loss in self-esteem). In fact, in many cases affirmative action may actually raise the self-esteem of women and minorities by providing them with employment and opportunities for advancement as well as increasing job satisfaction and organizational commitment among beneficiaries (Graves and Powell, 1994). In disputing the opinion that affirmative action makes for reversed discrimination, as they opined that one cannot cure discrimination with discrimination. Its supporters proposed that, job discrimination is grounded in prejudice and exclusion, whereas affirmative action is an effort to overcome prejudicial treatment through inclusion. The most effective way to cure society of exclusionary practices is to make special efforts at inclusion, which is exactly what affirmative action does. The logic of affirmative action is no different than the logic of treating a nutritional deficiency with vitamin supplements. For a healthy person, high doses of vitamin supplements may be unnecessary or even harmful, but for a person whose system is out of balance, supplements are an efficient way to restore the body's balance. According to Pious (2003), support for affirmative action could be said to mean support for preferential selection procedures that favor unqualified candidates over qualified candidates. However, most supporters of affirmative action oppose this type of preferential selection stating that preferential selection procedures can be ordered along the following continuum:
Selection among equally qualified candidates- the mildest form of affirmative action selection occurs when a female or minority candidate is chosen from a pool of equally qualified applicants. Survey research suggests that three-quarters of the public does not see this type of affirmative action as discriminatory. Selection among comparable candidates - a somewhat stronger form occurs when female or minority candidates are roughly comparable to other candidates. The logic here is similar to the logic of selecting among equally qualified candidates; all that is needed is an understanding that, for example, predictions based on a set score of 620 are virtually indistinguishable from predictions based on a sat score of 630. 66
Selection among unequal candidates - a still stronger form of affirmative action occurs when qualified female or minority candidates are chosen over candidates whose records are better by a substantial amount. Selection among qualified and unqualified candidates- the strongest form of preferential selection occurs when unqualified female or minority members are chosen over other candidates who are qualified. Although affirmative action is sometimes mistakenly equated with this form of preferential treatment, federal regulations explicitly prohibit affirmative action programs in which unqualified or unneeded employees are hired.
From the above observation; given the first of the four different procedures, the selection of women and minority members among equal or roughly comparable candidates has the greatest public support, adheres most closely to popular conceptions of fairness, and reduces the chances that affirmative action beneficiaries will be perceived as unqualified or undeserving. Also, the selection of women and minority members among unequal candidates used routinely in college admissions has deeply divided the nation. And finally, the selection of unqualified candidates is not permitted under federal affirmative action guidelines and should not be equated with legal forms of affirmative action. By distinguishing among these four different selection procedures, it becomes clear that opposition to stronger selection procedures need not imply opposition to milder ones.
Some writers have criticized affirmative action as a superficial solution that does not address deeper societal problems by redistributing wealth and developing true educational equality. Yet affirmative action was never proposed as a cure-all solution to inequality. Rather, it was intended only to redress discrimination in hiring and academic admissions. In assessing the value of affirmative action, the central question is merely this: in the absence of sweeping societal reforms unlikely to take place any time soon does affirmative action help counteract the continuing injustice caused by discrimination? The research record suggests, unequivocally, that it does (Kravitz and Platania, 1993; Nacoste, 1985; Turner and Pratkanis, 1994).
According to Warren (1977:256), “if individual men’s careers are temporarily set back because of (job preferences) given to women, the odds are good that these same men will have benefited in the past and/or will benefit in the future, not necessarily in the job competition, but 67 in some ways, from sexist discrimination against women. Conversely, if individual women receive apparently unearned bonuses (through preferential selection), it is highly likely that these same women will have suffered in the past and/ or will suffer in future from sexist attitude”
From the views of Sher (1975:165), “if racial and gender preferences for jobs were supposed to neutralize unfair competitive advantages, they needed to be calibrated to fit the variety of backgrounds aspirants brought to any competition for these goods. Simply giving blanket preferences to African-American or women seemed much too ham-handed an approach if the point was to micro distributes opportunities fairly”.
As a critic of affirmative action Newton (1973:310), opined that “… reverse discrimination violates the public equality which defines citizenship”. In support of affirmative action, Warnke (1998) argued that, any very general notion of equality can be employed as much to defined affirmative action. Opposing this, Cohen and Sterba (2003:25) urged that “it is wrong always and everywhere, to give special advantage to any group simply on the basis of physical characteristics”, Cohen however admitted that public policy may rightly tread some people differently because of their critical physical characteristics like which is on the ground of vital relevance for example, the state offering special assistance to old or disabled people. This is relevant in order to ensure that people do not live in poverty when they can no longer work.
However invoking substantive conception of equality Cohen and Sterba (2003:24) opined that “All members of human kind are equally ends in themselves, all have equal dignity, and therefore all are entitled to equal respect from the community and its laws”. This is in connection with the Aristotelian principle that “equals should be treated equally”. Hence Cohen believed all mankind are equal, and should competitive equally for merits, rather than preferential treatments.
However in support of affirmative action, Jacobs (2004), saw affirmative action as a means of overcoming structural exclusion hence, affirmative action helps in ensuring structural integration and structural integration serves the idea of equal opportunity. The annoyance of some affirmative action critics could be seen on quarrels over who deserves what? Do the beneficiaries of affirmative action deserve their benefits? Do the losers deserve their loss? They believe that, if affirmative action is claimed to administer justice, then its mechanisms must be adjusted as best they can to reward individual desert and true merit. As noted by Rosenfeld 68
(1991), affirmative action needs not to deprive anyone of any genuine equal opportunity right. Provided an affirmative action plan is precisely tailored to redress the losses in prospects of successes attributable to racism and gender, it only deprives innocent male of the corresponding undeserved increases in their prospects of success. Hence affirmative action does not take away from innocent males that they have rightfully earned or that they should be entitled to keep. In conclusion therefore, while critics of affirmative action insist that it is a reverse discrimination, breeds stigmatization and also retards “rneritocracy”, defenders of affirmative action maintain that affirmative action is good as it prevents discrimination, promotes integration or diversity, serve as a propellant for advancement and encouragement, as well as a being a medium to redness past injustices and subjugation.
Irrespective of various criticisms against gender affirmative action that; they are too little too late, or too much too hastily; that they are a reverse discrimination either punishing innocent generations who are made to pay for their ancestor’s misdeeds or enable the beneficiaries profit from other’s past sorrows; that they encourage laziness and mediocrity at the expense of hard work and just rewards, excellence and meritocracy; that those policies are really intended to, and actually do result into under developing same groups under the pretext of assisting them; that they merely touch at the super-structural levels of discrimination, leaving the foundations intact; and that they seem to be unending. When weighing the costs against the benefits of affirmative action, there will be equally the controversial question of how effective it has been. As some scholars opined that, women were the primary beneficiaries of affirmative action, while others view rejected the notion, arguing that “the actual results of affirmative action for women believe the rhetoric (Blum, 1991). In summary therefore, irrespective of the heated debates for and against gender- affirmative action, it is however, undeniable that affirmative action was structured to open many doors to women in various areas like federal governance that were previously closed to them; and for women to benefit from the positive policy, as have witnessed in some countries like Rwanda, India etc. The policy therefore, wearing faces of quota system and federal character principle in Nigeria are yet far from redressing any gender discrimination of the past, either have they altered any existing demographic reality or design in order to enrich women into power (federal governance), as criticized. Hence, criticisms partly lack basis in Nigeria context, as 69 women should be rather, given the ample support to enhance their adequate representation in federal governance.
4.5 Application to Nigerian Context Gender quota as an affirmative action measure has increasingly been viewed as an important policy measure for boosting women’s access to political positions throughout the world. In Africa, over 20 countries have legislated it as an instrument of creating opportunities for women in decision-making positions. On the other hand, some has viewed quota system as having negative effects. As noted by UNIFEM (1999), it opined that, increasing women’s share of seats in the parliament alone is not a solution as it does not guarantee they will make decisions that benefit the majority of women. Rather, can only level the playing field on which women battle for equality. In Nigeria, some women activist believes that, implementing quota may cause a problem. While introducing quota provide a means of addressing the gender imbalance in decision making, the practice lacks support from important political actors or meets opposition in societies that have patriarchal traditions. Those against quota system opined that it discriminate against men. Many gender activists also argue that quota may constitute a glass ceiling beyond which women cannot go unless they engage in additional struggle. Others contended that women who are in power under such a system may be undervalued or viewed as not politically deserving. Affirming this, Mata Sy Diallo Former Female Vice President of the Senegalese National Assembly said quota can only be a transitory solution not a cure for the makings of a true democracy (Salami, 2005).
However, be it a transitory or permanent measure, gender struggle is at its fundamental level in Nigeria hence; needs the support of quota system to groom and bring women to competitive level where they can compete on their own even without the aid of quota system. Therefore, there is pressing need to raise awareness of the use of gender quotas as an instrument to increase political representation of women in Nigeria. There should equally be coordinated, organized pressure from groups for the creation and implementation of quotas for women.
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CHAPTER FIVE: EFFECTS OF GENDER ON FEDERAL AFFIRMATIVE ACTION
The existence of affirmative action did not occur in a vacuum. Prior and after the introduction of federal affirmative action, the roles of women across political participation varied and vary from time to time. It is opined that discrimination against women take different forms in different societies and historical epochs, based on this standpoint, this chapter examined: the Status of Gender in Pre-colonial era, Colonial and Post-colonial (Independence) era; the Effects of Affirmative Action on Gender; Needs cum Emergence of Federal Affirmative Action; and Evaluation of Impacts of Federal Affirmative Action on Gender Equality and Women Empowerment.
5.1 Status of Women in Pre-Colonial Nigeria During the pre-colonial period, women played vital roles in both social and economic activities. Division of labour was on gender lines as women took charge of occupations like: pottery making, food processing, cooking and mat weaving. Women had access to land through their husbands and parents, which was communally owned and they were indeed central to trading activities. Among the Yoruba, women were the major figures in long-distance trade, with enormous opportunities for accumulating wealth and acquiring titles. The most successful among them rose to the prestigious chieftaincy title of Iyalode, a position of great privilege and power. In politics, females were not totally powerless as portrayed by modern literature, this because, the era had the family as basic unit of political organization and common matrifocal arrangement which allowed women to exercise reasonable authority over their children, hence a woman and her children could form a major power bloc in the household. Power and privileges in the family were equally based on age and gender, thereby allowing elder women to have a voice on many matters, and because both private and public arenas were intertwined, a woman’s ability to control resources and people in a household was at the same time an exercise in public power. She could employ food production to command respect; she could control her children and influence men through this power; she could also, evoke the power of the gods in her favour, or could simply withdraw and use the kitchen as her own personal domicile for interaction with her colleagues, friends and children (Palmers, 1928). Beyond household levels, power was generally dominated by the male folk, although in some areas, specific titles were given to women for instance, the queen mother, a powerful title 71 among the Yoruba and Edo, could be given to king’s mother or a true woman of considerable stature. The queen mother, in her own palace presided over meetings with subordinate title holders in her support. However, Hausa and Yoruba legends describe periods when women were either the actual kings or heroines, such women as Amina of Zaria and Moremi of the Ile-Ife notable le gendary figures, as are the powerful queens in the Ondo and Daura histories. Prior to Nigerian independence, women played prominent roles in the governance of different societies as they also, held vital positions among the majority of ethnic groups particularly the Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo. Women participation then was through the institution of female chiefs, the authority of the first daughter and age grade associations. In Hausa land for instance, women had a very high status during the pre- colonial era. This was given to the fact that, the people belonged to a civilization characterized by matrilineal succession in the ruling class and the women (female) held high political offices for examples, the 15 th century history of Zaria witnessed the rein of Queen Amina who succeeded her father and conquered all the towns around Zamfara and Nupe and dominated these regions for 34 years. She equally introduced fortifications into the Hausa cities during her time (Palmers, 1928).
Given the fact that females in the Yoruba land did not practice seclusion, they moved freely and also controlled the market politics especially among the Yoruba and Edo. In the Oyo Empire, the system of government was hierarchical, and was based on system of checks and balances. The females were not excluded in the government as their positions were very sensitive therefore, they performed crucial functions. They occupied positions like; Iya Oba, Iya Kere, Iyalagbon, Iya Mode and Iya Lode. On the side of the Alafin, his plenty wives served as the “eyes” and “ears” of the king. They acted his secret service in the cause of their trading activities and hence, contributed to smooth administration of the place. The Iya Oba was the king’s official mother who gave advic e and words of wisdom to the king. The Iya Kwere wielded the greater power and authority in the palace, as she was the custodian of the palace treasury including royal insignia and king’s paraphemalia of office. It was her duty to equally crown the king in the coronation ceremony. Her position was indeed, of great political importance because she could sabotage any of the Oba’s public appearance by refusing allowing him the use of garments of office (Afonja, 1996). 72
The Iya Lagbon represented mother of the crown prince who also commanded great authority and she ruled over a part of the capital city. The Iya lode was responsible for the Oba’s spiritual care. She also looked after the women’s trading interests. These cabal of women formed effective groups of spokes women for political stability and humane rule as well as for the interest of females at the highest political level in the kingdom. The Edos also portrayed a high socio-political status of women in the traditional Yoruba society (Afonja, 1996).
In the Eastern Nigeria, leadership among the Igbo’s was achieved, not ascribed but women had their market and village groups where through their representatives matters affecting them were addressed at village meetings. During pre-colonial era, women in different parts of Nigeria formed powerful association to enable them pr esent an untied force. As opined by Attoe (2010), in the pre-colonial era, Nigerian women effectively participated in subsistence level economy of the country. Apart being mothers, wives and taking charge of the domestic sector, women immensely contributed to the production and distribution of goods and services. Agriculturally, women farmed with their husbands and children. In south east, women took part in processing of palm oil and palm kernel. They also participated in local and long distance trade in different parts of the country and were also involved in procurement and sales of various food items and related commodities. In the coastal areas like Niger Delta Area, Calabar etc, their pre-colonial women were also fully involved in food processing. Legally, the pre- colonial customary laws in most of her societies portrayed women as free adducts although certain limitations were imposed on them which subordinated women to male supremacy and rulership. Women were allowed independent access to income, and because land was communal owned, whoever tilled the land irrespective of gender reaped the benefit. That not notwithstanding, women in many societies could not inherit land. In regards to education, it enabled women to obtain skills in order to be independent or to earn a living. In this era, it was stated by Ogunsheye that “a woman who was without a craft or trade or who was totally dependent on her husband, was not only rare, but was regarded with contempt (Aliyu, 1992).
Politically, women in pre-colonial Nigeria made up integral part of the political set up of their communities. They performed complementary functions to men. According to Ola (1978), women in Bomu played vital part in the administration of the state. They held crucial positions 73 or offices in the royal family, including office of the Megira (the queen mother) and the gumsu (the first wife of the mai or king). In the political history of Zaria, women played active role in governance. The modern city of Zaria was founded in the half of the 16th century by a woman named Queen Bakwa Turuku, she had a daughter called Amina who later succeeded her as queen. Queen Amina was a great and powerful warrior, who built a high wall around Zaria in order to protect the city from invasion and extended the boundaries of her territory beyond Bauchi. The people of Kano and Katsina paid tribute to her. She immensely turned Zaria into a very prominent commercial centre in Nigeria (Atteo, 2010).
Emanating from the standpoint of Rojas (1990), religions of many Nigerian tribal societies just like the family and economic structure, conceived the position of women as complementary to that of men. However, the fact remained that the societies of pre-colonial Nigeria believed in men superiority to women and, to some extent, in control of women. According to Dennis (2011), the religions of many Nigerian societies recognized the social importance of women by emphasizing the place of female gods of fertility and social peace, but women were also associated with witchcraft which appeared to symbolize the potential social danger of women exercising power uncontrolled by men.
However, women basically held complementing rather than subordinate position to men in indigenous pre-colonial Nigeria, which rated power on seniority rather than gender. Societies in pre-colonial Nigeria believed women and men complemented each other, and had characteristics, some of which still exist today, that determined women’s and men’s functions in the society (Barr and Firmin, 1995).
According to Niara (1996), age not gender was a major deciding factor in who actively participated in government, performed certain duties, or earned titles. Even among men, seniority determined respect. In regards to Igbo land, the first son (Okpara) and first daughter (Ada) had greater status in the family than other offspring’s. Women equally earned power from kinship and hence; participated in decision making process or even acted as leaders, examples are; queen Amina of Zazzau (now Zaria) Princess Inipki of Igala, Moremi of Ife and Queen Kambassa of Ijaw who used their kingship and position in society to directly or indirectly influence political issues as far back as the tenth century (Abubakar, 1992; Awe, 1992). 74
Queen Amina of Zazzau inherited the throne from her mother and became one of the Africa’s most notable queens and warriors (Abubakar, 1992). As opined by Oyewumni (1997), men did not feel threatened when women were in powerful positions as it was usually determined that they deserved to be there because of age, kinship or merit rather than gender. According to Ezeani (1998), pre-colonial Nigeria encouraged gender equality and progress. Women could even oust men who were not performing their duties effectively, as pointed by Ohadoma (2000), in Onitsha of Anambra state, if a naked woman sat on the king’s throne, he was dethroned. This according to Nzegwu (2001) is called dual sex political system. Gender relations under a dual sex system enabled men and women to protect their rights, and respect what each other brought to community development and progress. Neither male nor female gender was neither privileged nor devalued (Nzegwu ,2001).
In this era, women held power in the religious sector where, with the existence of female deities, women had many opportunities to lead. As pointed out by Pearce (2001:4) among the Igbos, women “were said to have had a well defined Political rights, and conducted much of their business without male interference”
5.2 Status of Women in Colonial Nigeria There was a sharp departure of women’s liberty and participatory rating in the colonial era of Nigeria. According to Curtin (1964), the colonial economy was export oriented which greatly downsized the prestige of traditional occupations of Nigeria women. This placed women at a great disadvantaged position, while on the other hand enhanced the economic status of British, Lebanese, Syrian and few male Nigerian merchants. Many of the smaller markets dominated by women were gradually dismantled as a result of emergence of expatriated firms such as united African company (UAC), john holt, lever brothers etc. Women were denied access to medium and large scale loans which were vital in running at bulk purchase level of the colonial economy. In agriculture, cash crop incentives, technology and innovations were restricted to men. Colonial policies and laws were explicitly gender based and biased against women. Education at this era was functional, as the curricula emphasized religious instruction and clerical skills for boys while domestic sciences for girls, to enable them become good house wives rather than income earners. Technological and scientific based education was not 75 supported. Politically, women were adversely denied the franchise, while very few were offered any political or administrative appointments. For instance, in 1950s only Chief (Mrs.) Olufunmilayo Ransomekuti (for Western Nigeria House of Chiefs); Chief (Mrs.) Margaret Ekpo and Janet Mokelu (both for Eastern Nigeria) were appointed into the House of Chiefs (Effah, 2010).
Unlike the pre-colonial, colonial era changed most elements of the kinship support system. The customary law became heavily informed by colonial misconceptions. Nigerian women lost a great deal of authority to participate in decision making due to the exclusion from all levels of administration. They equally lost maneuverability because male dominated element of society were highly stressed above all others and applied in social, economic and political life hence; the imposition of colonial rule infused a system where women generally had less opportunity to participate in all round administration. Economically, men were structured to lay hold on most of the opportunities. Legally, the system deprived women most benefits they had prior to colonial era. Religiously, a system of belief that striped off the pre-colonial religious power and authority of women was introduced and educationally, males were given upper hand in training more than their female counterparts. Under this era, education was not widely extended to women as women were basically prepared for domestic roles. This in return, reflected in the lower parentage of women in most professional and academics subject areas.
The colonization of Nigeria by Britain diluted the pre-colonial place of women in the society. For example, with the incorporation of Nigeria into international economy as a supplier of raw materials, new patriarchal views of the appropriate social role for women dictated by colonial administrators and missionaries changed the position of women in economic and social and endeavours. Nigerian men began to dominate the cultivation of cash crops for the international market while women were limited to growing food crops which yielded lesser incomes’ hence; the bureaucratic efforts to improve agriculture enhanced further separation of economic roles of men and women that had previously complemented each other. The importation of cheap manufactured goods from Europe and Japan also led to the decline of most craft industry which further deteriorated the women’s income
The colonial administrators infused into the society the assumptions of European patriarchy which changed orientation of men hence saw women’s role to be the homes, child 76 rearing and other domestic chores. They were taught to consider women as subordinate to men, and that if they (women) attain financial freedom they might not give their husbands and their families their due respects, as against what was obtainable in the pre-colonial era where both gender complemented and co-habited peacefully (Rojas, 1990).
The colonial state displaced the place of Nigerian women and infused into the society European “patriarchatism” among which propelled series of protest by women which in long run, directly or indirectly contributed to Nigerian struggle and eventually her independence in 1960.
5.3 Status of Nigerian Women in Post Colonial Era The inception of independence witnessed active role of women in various aspects of the nation’s development. Women hence took over an increasing activity in food production contributing between 50% and 70% of Nigeria’s food requirement especially as most able bodied men moved to urban areas in search for greener pastures. In 1965, only 6.9 percent of the salaried workforces were women, by 1970; 8.7% of the total numbers of established staff in federal civil service were women, the percentage increased to 12.6 in 1980; this pattern was equally duplicated in state level (Effah, 2012). Educationally, according to the population reference bureau 1981, only 6% Nigerian adults were literate, by 1979, 72.9% urban girls and 80.8% of rural girls were not attending school. This negatively reflected in the number of girls that attended university level. Given this inequality, several successive post colonial governments have encouraged female education yet; impact of the affirmative action is still low of which negative perception that women need education only to be good housewives contributed a lot.
The post colonial era inherited legal system of the colonial era; which does not augur well for women’s self advancement and participation in national development for example, “manied women” had to obtain their husband’s written permission to obtain international passports. Until very recently women were not equally allowed to stand bail for a suspect. These inherited statutory provisions do not favour women in certain area like in heritance. Politically, women have been a reckonable force in terms of voting, massive support for various political parties etc. Yet they are politically subjugated and underrepresented in governance. 77
As comparatively observed by Alyssa (2001), at present Nigerian women play a minimal role in politics irrespective of the fact that the 1979 constitution guaranteed their rights as against the pre-colonial Nigeria where women had a much larger position in politics. In colonial era, western influences restricted women’s participation unlike in post colonial women has relatively little opportunity to become involved.
Political parties contribute a lot by not looking favourably upon female candidates. As western values gained influence in colonial Nigeria, women lost some of their traditional rights. For most parts, Nigerian women have not attempted to rise from their male dominated society hence; patriarchy has continued to thrive. However, as under-representation continued to unfold, women have begun to demand for some equality, thereby attracting government’s mediation through affirmative action.
5.4 The Effects of Affirmative Action on Gender Affirmative action is controversial; it stimulates strong oppositions and strong supports. That notwithstanding, affirmative action has been discovered to have effects on several gender issues, one of which is on the targeted and non-targeted groups. On considering effects of affirmative action on targeted group (women), affirmative action has identified effects on motivation, interest, choice and commitment on gender. According to Chacko (1982), women who believe their sex was the reason for their hiring are prone to exit lower job commitment and satisfaction and greater role ambiguity and conflict than women who did not believe gender played an important role in their employment or appointment. In the same vein, Turner, Pratkanis and Hardaway (1991) and Turner and Pratkanis (1993) found that selection on the basis of gender does not directly impair self-reported motivation for a task. In a national field study on this, Taylor (1994) examined the attitude of 319 white women, 40 black women, and 32 black men who said they worked for firms that either did or did not employ affirmative action procedures. Result showed that white women working for firms with affirmative action program did not differ significantly from white women working for firms without such programs in their self reports of job satisfaction; but that of black men and women differed in their evaluations of the degree of excitement in their lives. Black men working for firms without affirmative action reported more positive evaluations than did black 78 men working for firms with affirmative action programs: black women showed the opposite pattern. In a mail survey reported by Graves and Powell (1994), 188 MBA graduates (61 of whom were male, 96 of whom were white) were asked to indicate the influence of gender in general and of gender based affirmative action in past and future selection decisions, and to indicate their job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and intent to remain with their organizations. Result indicated that, men felt their gender benefited them in selection and promotion decisions more than did women. Women felt that they benefited from gender based affirmative action procedures more than did men. Job satisfaction was affected by respondent gender, perceptions of the overall influence of gender in selection decisions, and perception of gender based affirmative action. For men, satisfaction and commitment increased as discrimination against males decreased, remained level when practices were gender neutral or favoured men somewhat, and increased when practices offered a great advantage to men. For women, satisfaction was not related to the effect of gender on selection practices. Commitment, however, increased as perceptions of overall influence of gender increased. Unlike the satisfaction measure, gender moderated the relationship between perceptions of affirmative action and commitment. Females were more committed when they perceived that affirmative action practices were advantageous to females. For males, commitment increased as affirmative action practices were perceived as sex neutral or as favouring males, and then leveled off. On effects of affirmative action on self-evaluation, ability and performance, research suggested that affirmative action, under certain conditions, may affect women’s self evaluation of abilities and performance. Most experimental studies examining this used a paradigm developed by Jacobson and Koch (1977). They paired male participants with a female confederate who was assigned to a leadership position on the basis of gender (strong preferential treatment), chance or superior performance on a test (merit). After performing a one way communication task with the confederate, the dyad was told they had either succeeded or failed at the task. Heilman et al (1987) used a similar paradigm to examine leaders self perceptions. Females and male participants were told they were selected for a leadership role in a one way communication task on the basis of either merit or gender. In the merit based selection condition, participants were told that their scores on a test purportedly measuring leadership 79
ability indicated they were qualified to assume the leadership role. In the gender selection condition, participants were told that insufficient numbers of males or females had participated in the study and that because of their respective gender they would assume the leadership role. Also, the participants were told their dyad had either succeeded or failed. Results showed that females who were selected on the basis of their gender evaluated their leadership ability and their global task performance more poorly than did females who were selected on the basis of merit. Males in contrast, were largely unaffected by the selection procedure. Moreover, these results occurred despite the level of objective feedback concerning task performance. As observed by Major, Feinstein and Crocker (1994), the self evaluations of leader’s skills were affected by the interaction of participant sex with selection procedure. When selected on the basis of sex alone, male evaluated their skills more positively than females. The self evaluations of males and females did not differ, when they were selected on the basis of merit and on the basis of both sex and merit. Interestingly, somewhat in contrast to Heilman et al (1990), self evaluations of leader’s skill were not affected directly by selection procedure. As noted by Major (1994), he also made known that leaders selected on the basis of sex believed their qualifying score and ability were less important in their selection than did participants selected on the basis of merit and on the basis of sex and merit. Additionally, men were less likely to say their sex was an important factor in their selection than were women. On the effects of affirmative action on performance, as opined by Brutus and Ryan (1994), performances vary with the interaction of selection procedure and self efficacy. Self- efficacy have stronger effect on performance when the selection procedure is ambiguous than when it is clearly merit-based. In an experiment carried out, Nacoste (1989) told 48 males and 49 female participants that they were selected for participation in the experiment on the basis of either merit or sex. There were equal members of male and female participants who thought affirmative action policies were fair or unfair. On a brainstorming task, Nascoste found no differences due to selection procedure or fairness perceptions. Lastly as experimented by (Turner and Pratkains 1993, 1994a; 1994b; Turner et al; 1991), they developed a model in which affirmative action can be seen as a form of help like other forms of assistance, it can induce positive consequences, negative consequences or a combination of both. According to the model, affirmative action engenders immediate negative 80 outcomes when it is self threatening. Its shorten consequences are predicted to translate into long term negative outcomes of learned helplessness and dependence when the recipient perceives a low level of personal control to change the situation. However, when the recipient feels a high level of personal control, more positive consequences such as attempts to alter the organizational situation or attempts to improve the recipient’s situation are possible. In contrast, Turner and Pratkanis suggested that affirmative action induces positive consequences when it is self supportive for the recipient. When affirmative action provides positive self relevant messages (that is, it provides clear, unambiguous, and focused evidence of qualifications); conforms to important societal norms (that is, it is procedurally fair, promotes independence and self reliance and rewards excellence); and provides instrumental benefits (that is, it provides indications of future success and removes barriers to success and advancement); it is likely to produce positive, immediate and long term results. From the review, it was noted that affirmative action policies may have positive, negative or both consequences for recipients. That woman’s task choices and self evaluations of ability and performance can be negatively affected by gender-based selection methods that provide no evidence of recipient qualifications. Programs that provide clear, unambiguous and focused evidence of recipient qualifications, in contrast, did not appear to impair task choice or self evaluations of performance and ability. The selection procedure did not appear to strongly affect women’s motivation. Be it as it may, affirmative action can only exert its consequences when it is in operation. In the case of Nigeria, the government has mapped out measures that claimed to address gender disparities, especially in representation in federal governance. However, one can only evaluate the effects of affirmative action when there are affirmative actions in operation. The question is, is federal character principles and quota system the rightful tools or measures to redress gender imbalances? How implementing and effective are other measures put in place? Have they been able to generate any progressive out come?
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5.5 The Need Cum Emergence of Federal Affirmative Action in Nigeria
Irrespective of the fact that, the universe generally belongs to both genders (male and female), women have however, been discriminated from engaging in some legal activities within same collectively owned universe therefore, infringing on their human rights which in return, place them far below in the attainment of common goods such as: education and training, socialization, freedom economic empowerment, employment, human development and imperatively representation in governance.
The gross disparities in accessing these common goods spilled over to heated struggle by the famine gender, demanding for gender equality which eventually led to the emergence of federal affirmative action in Nigeria. According to Isalami (2005), Nigerian politics is predominately politics of men, men dominated political arena, men formulate the rules of the political game and men define the standards for evaluations. The political life is based on male norms and values, while women are marginal to national politics. Therefore, the deep disparities and effects of gender inequality in the modern world have called for attention and action in order to bridge gender gap and to enhance gender empowerment and progress. Based on this, the call to promote women in decision-making globally drew higher attention in the 1980s and early 1990s through series of held international conferences amidst regional and sub-regional most ones. Most impactful of all was the fourth women conference in Beijing (China) in 1995, which advocated for not less than 30% representation of women in national governments which most countries acceded to. Given these acknowledgements of women needs as well as global resolutions, some African States especially those of Eastern and Southern African utilized these medium to open up spaces and opportunities in politics for their women. For example, governments of South Africa, Rwanda and Uganda have more women in politics than many developed democracies. This was given to their clear affirmative action in political institutions and processes to favour women’s participation. Research showed that Rwandan women are among world’s ranking women in parliaments with 49% of representation compared to a world’s average of 15.1 percentages, hence over taking Sweden where women constitute 45% of parliamentarians. In Africa, countries like South Africa, Mozambique, Rwanda, Uganda and Seychelles have long surpassed the 30% 82 minimum threshold in decision-making for women recommended in the Beijing Platform of Action, in 1995 (Isalami, 2005). South African women achieved commitment for a one-third quota in the eighties, but have now moved to 50/50 call for parity while Nigeria is still far from attaining the basic minimum 30% Beijing Conference demand, irrespective of the fact that, her women are at least, half of the country’s population whose numerical strength have not translated to significant increase in women representation in governance or decision-making position. When policy decisions are made for the benefit of Nigerians, the extent to which the government body is able to carry every Nigerian along will determine the degree to which its decision will be appropriated and meet the general needs of the nation. Enhancing proper representation of women in decision-making will not only bring about radical changes in structures of power but, promote national development. This because, gender equality is a key element of development, as the status of men and women is fundamental to sustainable development in any society. However, sustainable development could be connected to gender, as gender inequality is linked to social-cultural environment. In Nigeria, the culture of patriarchy has been allowed to infringe very seriously on human rights of women, socialization of children and development practice through policies. According to Olabisi (1998), culture is a strong explanatory variable in understanding the predominant gender ideology within the Nigerian society. Nigeria is a highly patriarchal society where men dominate all spheres of women’s lives which therefore serve as impediment to women’s proper representation in governance. Educationally, education is a public good. It improves the individual’s quality of life and grants one easy access to employment, income and political power. Women education is crucial because, it is a key to gender equality, justice and poverty reduction. Education also affects political positioning and improves gender power relations. Inequality in education, associated with gender was taken for granted in Nigeria for many years, as it was assumed that both genders would have equal educational opportunities. In recent past, government adopted a number of educational policies such as: free education for primary and secondary schools, government take-over of secondary schools in a number of states, the establishment of more government schools and provisions of bursary and scholarship 83 awards by states and federal government to students at the tertiary level, there were adopted in order to facilitate access to education by all students, particularly female students. Irrespective of some implementation challenges that confronted the policies, it was noted that, the imbalances in gender ratios at primary, secondary and tertiary levels of education seem to have considerably reduced but not exterminated. As noted by UNESCO (2000), the overall female illiteracy in Nigeria was 44% of general population, with adult literacy being about 33%. In comparison with same report of UNESCO (1995), 85million of the 145million children aged 6-11 not in school were girls as major constraints against female education at this level included: cultural and religious beliefs, economic factors and lack of access. Data indicated that about 70% of women in Nigeria were illiterates, while 22-4% of women living in urban areas had no education, compared to 50.2% in the rural areas. Enrollment rate was generally low (60% national average, 74% for boys and 56% for girls, with a gender gap of 18%). For primary schools, the rate of enrollment in 2005 for male was 56% as compared to 44.88% for women. Disparity in primary school enrollment presented a big gap between the north (52%) and the south (81.7%), the urban (70%) and the rural (56%) and as low as 42% in the northwest. Regarding to higher education, the percentage of females in higher education in Nigeria was rated at 39.9%, while access to females to university education increased from ratio of 1 to 40 in the 1950s to 1 to 4 in 2001. However, a wide disparity existed and still exists in traditionally male dominated disciplines such as the field of engineering etc (Situation Analysis Report, OAU Ife, 2002). The above analysis pointed the gender discrimination that existed in the field of education of whose its side effects (psychologically, educationally, socially and politically) necessitated the emergence of federal affirmative action. From economic standpoint, despite Nigeria’s rich endowment with natural and human resources, she yet ranks among the poorest countries in the world. In 2005 human development index, Nigeria was among the 20 countries with the lowest human development index, and was ranked 158 in a table of 177 countries (UNDP, 2005). As stated by Akanji (2000), trade and entrepreneurial activities have continued to be engendered in the form of access, control and remuneration. While commercial agriculturists and traders (mainly men) supply their commodities to big national, regional and international 84 markets, the smaller entrepreneurs (mainly women) are left to supply the local villages and rural markets. In response therefore, women have been found to devise ways of going beyond local petty trading. Some of which are illegal activities such as cross-border trade or acting as itinerant trade agents. In the economic sector, women are often pushed to the informal sector which is less profit oriented and undervalued in Nigeria, hence making them earn lower than their male counterparts. It is imperative to state that, gender discrimination in the arena of work poses a great problem not just to women but to the entire fabric of society. As noted by OECD, if society and all that underpins it are to run smoothly in the 1990s and beyond, women must be given a priority role in economic life and allowed to make the most of their untapped potentials. Women account for more than fifty percent of the world’s population. They perform two- third of the world’s work, yet earn one-tenth of the world’s income and own one-hundredth of the world’s poverty. The case is more worrisome in Nigeria where her over 163 million population earned her the world’s seventh most populated country. The country has 49 percent of females comprising of 80.2 million girls and women but regrettably, thirty-eight percent of her women (females) lack formal education as against the seven percent of their male counterpart. Nigeria is pitiably rated the 118th of 134 countries in the gender equality index.
In a gender review and analysis by DFID (2012), it noted that, Nigeria’s 80.2 million women and girls have significantly worse life chances than men and also their sisters in comparable societies. This reveals the neglect of the Nigerian people and government in tackling the issue of gender inequality despite calls from various quarters. The analysis stated that, women are Nigeria’s hidden resource, it further exposed that over 1.5 million Nigeria children aged 6-14(8.1%) are currently not in school, a situation which has effortlessly earned Nigeria the world’s largest out of school children country, an unfortunate achievement of a robust nation. In eight northern states, over 80% of women are unable to read (compared with 54% for men), in Jigawa state, 94% of women (42% of men) are illiterate. According to them, the identified causes included: lack of funds resulting from wide-spread poverty, traditional and religious inclination which place low priority on educating the girl child, non-provision of educational facilities by government, poor funding of the educational sector, weak educational policies, early marriage, early childbirth, poor sanitation, and ignorance amongst others. 85
Women around the world are not only dynamic leaders but also, powerful advocates of change, however they are unfortunately constrained from making great impacts in their societies as could be seen that; by mid-2011, only 28 countries could claim that women’s parliamentary representation had reached a critical mass of 30 percent or more. Only 19 women were leading their countries as elected heads of state or government. In Nigeria for instance, only 25 out of the 360 members of the Nigerian House of Representatives are women and only about 4% of local government councilors are women also, confirming that women are under-represented in all political decision making bodies and their representation has not increased since the inception of democratic rule.
This therefore has not left tremendous negative effects on the country’s economy, democracy, peace and development. In acknowledging the need for gender equality, Nigerian Ambassador to the UN, Joy Ogwu, rightly noted that, “it is about having half of humanity participates. The progress of women means…the progress of the world”. According to UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, “when we empower women, we empower communities, nations and entire human family”. Therefore, coming to terms with the facts that; majority of Nigerian females are often confronted with poverty, gross inequality, molestation and several other injustices which occur as a result of factors like; poor education and low pay employment among others, which really could run through from birth to death if nothing serious is done. Government therefore deemed it necessary to introduce federal affirmative action to mitigate these causes and effects of gender inequality in the country (Elegbede, 2012).
Therefore, given several causes and effects of gender discrimination, government introduced some measures geared at bridging the inequality gap between the both genders as well as to enhance women’s participation not only in the educational and economic sector but also with the political sector included. Politically, some of the measures include; introduction of federal character and quota system.
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5.6 Evaluations of the Impacts of Affirmative Action on Gender Equality and Women Representation in Governance
Federal Character is a Commission established by Nigeria Act of Parliament in 1995. The Commission’s principle is such that has occupied a pride of place in all government policies; put in place to address problems of discrimination and under-representation. Its principles essentially refer to the recognition of the plural nature of the country in recruitment, distribution of administrative and political offices and power as well as the resources of the country. The objective is to ensure the composition and conduct of public institutions and affairs reflect the country’s diversity. It is premised on the ground that when national institutions and affairs are reflective in composition and conduct of the pluralism of the country, then a sense of belonging is likely to be evoked from the citizenry. It is also designed to mitigate, if not obviate, the bellicose political struggle that characterized previous Nigeria’s democratic system (Obiyan and Akindele, 2002). Universally, males and females are proven capable of indispensible contributions to human growth and development. The place of women in the place of authority cannot be overemphasized as women like Lady Margaret Thatcher one time Prime Minister of Britain; Mrs. Curazin Aquino, Mrs Indira Ghandi, Ms. Benazir Bhutto and Mrs. Golda Meir of Philippines, India, Pakistan and Israel respectively were proofs of women competence in power. However, in every society women exercise some degree of influence or power; but the extent of that power depends largely on the gender system of culture prevailing in a particular society (Leacock, 1986). While some cultures augur well for participation of women some deliberately discriminate against females in filling certain positions. In pre-colonial Nigeria, women’s treatment depended on different communities, as they were not uniformly treated. For instance, in Yoruba land, women’s participation in governance in some kingdoms knew no bound as some women wielded the highest political authority. From 1393 to 1419AD, a woman known as Eye Aro was the ruler in Akure while between 1511 and 1552 AD Yeyenirewu also a woman was the ruler of Ado Ekiti (Afonja, 1986). Till today, women are still recognized in leadership of the land. Though women exerted authority at several levels of power, this importantly did not imply that there was complete 87 gender equality among the Yoruba, as there was no known recent era that woman ascended the throne of Oba in Yoruba land (Afonja, 1975). The story was not same in some areas, the level of women participation in public affairs was at best, quite dissatisfying. The problem of gender imbalances spilled across pre-colonial to post independence era which at present has generated heated and aggressive struggle for redress. It is upon this that government aimed to redress the imbalances in the country through measures like federal character and quota system. At the heart of the principle is the attempt to eschew group imbalances in public institutions and affairs, but the definition of that “group” unfortunately did not include gender both in the conception and implementation of the principle. Although there are legal provisions that tend to guarantee the equality of all individuals and groups including women, but there is still no legally backed affirmative action to promote gender balance. A close look at the principle of federal character as articulated in the different policy and legal documents revealed that, it is not envisaged to have under its ambit the reversion of gender imbalances in public affairs and institutions. This was underscored by the fact that, the issue of appropriate unit of representation for the purpose of pursuing the goals of the principle, has always been on such areas as “states”, “ethnicity” and “territorial zones”. This was further reinforced by the fact that, in its enforcement, some of these yield sticks form the basis of the unit of its representation. Hence, even though the federal character principle is partially designed to handle problems associated with imbalances and discriminations, it is not focused on gender imbalances. Therefore, the principles of federal character rightly lack the principles and provisions to be the right affirmative action to redress gender imbalances and discriminations in the composition and conduct of public institutions, affairs and in promoting women’s adequate representation in federal governance, as it mainly reflects in its public appointment the multi variables of a multi-cultural, multilingual and multi-religious. Nevertheless, Federal Character Principles could be broadened to include provisions which would encapsulate gender representation. This could be achieved by introducing a clause stipulating a minimum quota or cut-off point for women representation in certain political offices. The fact remains that, none of the affirmative action, measures or efforts put in place so far by the government namely; Federal Character Principle and Quota System, Accession to 88
International Women related Resolutions like the 1995 Beijing Conference; creation of Federal Ministry of Women Affairs and formulation of National Gender Policy of 2006 among others, have been able to achieve the goal of addressing gender imbalances in the social, economic and political sector, hence Nigerian females are still subjugated by same system that claimed to redress gender inequality. Affirming this, Nigerian women and children are trafficked domestically and abroad for forced labour and sexual exploitation as record has that, Nigeria women and girls’ make-up approximately 70 percent of estimated 70, 000 African women victims of trafficking that irrespective of the efforts of National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTI P) which have increased prosecution of offenders (Levan and Ukata, 2012). Women rights are enshrined in the constitution, yet they still face violence and substantial hindrances to political participation, like; female genital mutilation, attitude of sharia law discriminating against women (example of adultery), and customary laws which favour men over women with respect to property rights, thereby kicking against the place of women in the society. Similarity, the overall results in elective and appointive positions from 1999 to 2011 have equally shown that, neither of the affirmative action claimed to be put in place to redress gender imbalances of women in governance have actually been effective. The tables below illustrate these points:
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Table 1: Statistics of Local Government Chairmen in the Fourth Republic S/N States Male Female 1 Abia 17 0 2 Adamawa 20 0 3 Akwa-lbom 31 0 4 Anambra 20 1 5 Bauchi 20 0 6 Bayelsa 8 0 7 Benue 22 1 8 Borno 27 0 9 Cross rivers 18 0 10 Delta 25 0 11 Ebonyi 13 0 12 Edo 18 0 13 Ekiti 16 0 14 Enugu 17 0 15 FCT 5 1 16 Gombe 11 0 17 Imo 26 1 18 Jigawa 27 0 19 Kaduna 22 1 20 Kano 44 0 21 Katsina 33 1 22 Kebbi 21 0 23 Kogi 21 0 24 Kwara 16 0 25 Lagos 20 1 26 Nasarawa 12 0 27 Niger 25 0 28 Ogun 20 0 29 Ondo 18 0 30 Osun 29 1 31 Oyo 33 0 32 Plateau 16 1 33 Rivers 23 0 34 Sokoto 33 0 35 Taraba 16 0 36 Yobe 17 0 37 Zamfara 14 0 Total 774 8 Source: Nda (2003), Women in the Power Equation of Nigerian Politics. Lagos: Dat and Partners Logistics Ltd.
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Table 2: Gender Statistics on State Governors and Deputy Governors in the Fourth Republic
S/n State Male Females Deputy Deputy (Governors) (Governors) Governors Governors (Male) (Females) 1 Abia 1 0 1 0 2 Adamawa 1 0 1 0 3 Akwa-lbom 1 0 1 0 4 Anambra 1 0 1 0 5 Bauchi 1 0 1 0 6 Bayelsa 1 0 1 0 7 Benue 1 0 1 0 8 Borno 1 0 1 0 9 Cross rivers 1 0 1 0 10 Delta 1 0 1 0 11 Ebonyi 1 0 1 0 12 Edo 1 0 1 0 13 Ekiti 1 0 1 0 14 Enugu 1 0 1 0 15 Fct 1 0 1 0 16 Gombe 1 0 1 0 17 Imo 1 0 1 0 18 Jigawa 1 0 1 0 19 Kaduna 1 0 1 0 20 Kano 1 0 1 0 21 Katsina 1 0 1 0 22 Kebbi 1 0 1 0 23 Kogi 1 0 1 0 24 Kwara 1 0 1 0 25 Lagos 1 0 0 1 26 Nasarawa 1 0 1 0 27 Niger 1 0 1 0 28 Ogun 1 0 1 0 29 Ondo 1 0 1 0 30 Osun 1 0 1 0 31 Oyo 1 0 1 0 32 Plateau 1 0 1 0 33 Rivers 1 0 1 0 34 Sokoto 1 0 1 0 35 Taraba 1 0 1 0 36 Yobe 1 0 1 0 37 Zamfara 1 0 1 0 Total 36 0 35 1 Source: Nda (2003), Women in the Power Equation of Nigerian Politics. Lagos: Dat and Partners Logistics Ltd.
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Table 3: Gender Statistics of Fourth Republic Presidency
S/N Office Male Female 1 President 1 0 2 Vice President 1 0 3 Senior Minister 25 4 4 Junior Minister 15 3 5 Head of Service 1 0 6 Secretary to Govt of the 1 0 Federation 7 Chief of Staff to the 1 0 President 8 Special Advisers 14 2 9 Deputy Chief of Staff 1 0 10 Permanent Secretaries 40 8 11 Directors Generals 3 0 12 Senior Special Assistants 11 2 13 Chief of Protocol 1 0 14 Deputy Chief of Staff to 1 0 the Vice President 15 Deputy Chief Press 1 0 Secretary to the VP 16 PA to the President 1 0 17 Principal Secretary to the 1 0 President 18 Special Assistants to the 20 6 President 19 Special Assistants to the 4 1 VP 20 Accountant-General of the 1 0 Federation 21 Auditor-General of the 1 0 Federation Total 145 26
Source : Nda (2003), Women in the Power Equation of Nigerian Politics. Lagos: Dat and Partners Logistics Ltd
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Table 4: Gender Desegregated Table of Elective Political Positions 1999/2003 in Nigeria
Position Male Female Total % Female President 1 - 1 0 Vice president 1 - 1 0 Speakers 35 1 - 2.7 Governors 36 0 36 00 Deputy Governors 35 1 36 2.7 L.G.A. Chairpersons 765 9 785 1.2 Councilors 8,667 143 8810 1.6 State Assembly 978 12 990 1.2 Members Senators 106 3 109 1.2 House of 347 13 360 3.3 Representatives Sources : Women’s Consortium of Nigeria (2004)
Table 5: A Gender Desegregated Comparative Table on Elective Political Positions for 1999/2003 and 2003/2007 in Nigeria
S/N Position No. Of available No. Of women No. Of women seats elected & % of total elected & % of total in 1999 in 2003 1 Presidency 1 0 0% 0 0% 2 Senate 109 3 2.8% 3 2.8% 3 House of 360 0 0% 0 0% Representatives 4 Governorship 36 0 0% 0 0% 5 State House of 990 121 21% 38 3.8% Assembly Sources : Women’s Consortium of Nigeria (2004).
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Table 6: Some Appointments made by the Civilian Government at the Federal and State Levels from May 29th 1999 to 2003
S/N Appointment Total Men Women Women Source % 1 FG appointed Permanent 35 32 3 9 Vanguard June 10 th 1999 Secretaries 2 Federal Executive Council 49 43 6 17 Vanguard July 7 th 1999 3 Ambassadorial Nominees 106 96 10 9 This Day, August 20 th 1999 4 Senior Special Advisers To 14 13 1 7 This Day, June 28 th 1999 President 5 Chairpersons of the 5 5 5 - - This Day, June 29 th 1999 Committees Set Up by the House Of Rep. 6 Senate Committee 90 89 1 1 This Day, July 16 th 1999 (Chairpersons and Deputies) 7 Contract Review Panel 7 5 2 29 This Day, June 5 th 1999 8 Commissioners to INEC 3 2 1 33 Vanguard, August 25 th 1999 9 Probe Panels On Failed 12 10 2 17 Vanguard, July 16 th 1999 Contracts In Buhari, IBB and Abacha Regimes. 10 Ogun State Commissioners 9 0 - - This Day, July 1-1999 (SW) 11 Lagos State Commissioners 14 12 2 14 Vanguard 21 st 1999 (SW) 12 Ebonyi State Commissioners 10 9 1 9 This Day, June 14 th 1999 (SE) 13 Abia State Commissioners (SE) 14 11 3 21 This Day, June 14 th 1999 14 Edo State Commissioners(SS) 9 9 - - This Day, June 14 th 1999 15 Delta State Commissioners 10 9 1 10 Vanguard, June 30 th 1999 (SS) 16 Zamfara State Commissioners 11 11 - - This Day, June 10 th 1999 (NW) 17 Sokoto State Commissioners 11 10 1 9 This Day, June 18 th 1999 (NW) 18 Plateau State Commissioners 3 3 - - This Day, June 15 th 1999 (NC) 19 Kwara State Commissioners 11 9 2 10 This Day, June 30 th 1999 (NC) 20 Taraba State Commissioners 10 9 1 10 Vanguard July 16 th 1999 (NE) Various Sources Complied by the Researcher
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Table 7: World Classification of Women in Parliament
Lower or single House Upper House or Senate Rank Country Elections Seats* Women % W Elections Seats* Women % W
1 Rwanda 9 2008 80 45 56.3% 9 2011 26 10 38.5%
2 Andorra 4 2011 28 14 50.0% ------
3 Cuba 1 2008 586 265 45.2% ------
4 Sweden 9 2010 349 156 44.7% ------
5 Seychelles 9 2011 32 14 43.8% ------
6 Finland 4 2011 200 85 42.5% ------
7 South Africa 1 4 2009 400 169 42.3% 4 2009 53 17 32.1%
8 Netherlands 6 2010 150 61 40.7% 5 2011 75 27 36.0%
9 Nicaragua 11 2011 92 37 40.2% ------
10 Iceland 4 2009 63 25 39.7% ------
11 Norway 9 2009 169 67 39.6% ------
12 Mozambique 10 2009 250 98 39.2% ------
13 Denmark 9 2011 179 70 39.1% ------
14 Costa Rica 2 2010 57 22 38.6% ------
15 Angola 9 2008 220 84 38.2% ------
16 Belgium 6 2010 150 57 38.0% 6 2010 71 29 40.8%
17 Argentina 10 2011 257 96 37.4% 10 2011 72 28 38.9%
18 Spain 11 2011 350 126 36.0% 11 2011 263 88 33.5%
" United Republic of Tanzania 10 2010 350 126 36.0% ------
19 Uganda 2 2011 386 135 35.0% ------
20 Nepal 4 2008 594 197 33.2% ------
21 Germany 9 2009 620 204 32.9% N.A. 69 19 27.5%
22 Serbia 5 2012 250 81 32.4% ------
23 Ecuador 4 2009 124 40 32.3% ------
" Timor-Leste 6 2007 65 21 32.3% ------
24 New Zealand 11 2011 121 39 32.2% ------
" Slovenia 12 2011 90 29 32.2% 11 2007 40 1 2.5%
25 Belarus 9 2008 110 35 31.8% 7 2008 58 19 32.8%
26 Algeria 5 2012 462 146 31.6% 12 2009 136 7 5.1%
27 Guyana 11 2011 67 21 31.3% ------
28 The F.Y.R. of Macedonia 6 2011 123 38 30.9% ------
29 Burundi 7 2010 105 32 30.5% 7 2010 41 19 46.3% 95
30 Portugal 6 2011 230 66 28.7% ------
31 Trinidad and Tobago 5 2010 42 12 28.6% 6 2010 31 8 25.8%
32 Switzerland 10 2011 200 57 28.5% 10 2011 46 9 19.6%
33 Austria 9 2008 183 51 27.9% N.A. 61 19 31.1%
34 Ethiopia 5 2010 547 152 27.8% 5 2010 135 22 16.3%
35 Afghanistan 9 2010 249 69 27.7% 1 2011 102 28 27.5%
36 Tunisia 10 2011 217 58 26.7% ------
37 South Sudan 8 2011 332 88 26.5% 8 2011 50 5 10.0%
38 El Salvador 3 2012 84 22 26.2% ------
" Mexico 7 2009 500 131 26.2% 7 2006 128 29 22.7%
39 Bolivia 12 2009 130 33 25.4% 12 2009 36 17 47.2%
40 Iraq 3 2010 325 82 25.2% ------
41 Lao People's Democratic Republic 4 2011 132 33 25.0% ------
" Lesotho 5 2012 120 30 25.0% 3 2007 33 7 21.2%
" Luxembourg 6 2009 60 15 25.0% ------
42 Australia 8 2010 150 37 24.7% 8 2010 76 29 38.2%
" Canada 5 2011 308 76 24.7% N.A. 103 39 37.9%
43 Sudan 4 2010 354 87 24.6% 5 2010 28 5 17.9%
44 Namibia 11 2009 78 19 24.4% 11 2010 26 7 26.9%
" Viet Nam 5 2011 500 122 24.4% ------
45 Kazakhstan 1 2012 107 26 24.3% 8 2011 47 2 4.3%
46 Liechtenstein 2 2009 25 6 24.0% ------
47 Croatia 12 2011 151 36 23.8% ------
48 Poland 10 2011 460 109 23.7% 10 2011 100 13 13.0%
49 Singapore 5 2011 98 23 23.5% ------
50 Kyrgyzstan 10 2010 120 28 23.3% ------
51 Latvia 9 2011 100 23 23.0% ------
52 Philippines 5 2010 284 65 22.9% 5 2010 23 3 13.0%
53 Senegal 6 2007 150 34 22.7% 8 2007 100 40 40.0%
54 Pakistan 2 2008 342 77 22.5% 3 2012 104 17 16.3%
55 Malawi 5 2009 193 43 22.3% ------
" United Kingdom 5 2010 650 145 22.3% N.A. 827 181 21.9%
56 Mauritania 11 2006 95 21 22.1% 11 2009 56 8 14.3%
57 Czech Republic 5 2010 200 44 22.0% 10 2010 81 15 18.5%
" Eritrea 2 1994 150 33 22.0% ------
" Uzbekistan 12 2009 150 33 22.0% 1 2010 100 15 15.0%
58 Italy 4 2008 630 136 21.6% 4 2008 321 61 19.0% 96
59 Peru 4 2011 130 28 21.5% ------
60 Bosnia and Herzegovina 10 2010 42 9 21.4% 6 2011 15 2 13.3%
61 China 3 2008 2978 635 21.3% ------
62 Bulgaria 7 2009 240 50 20.8% ------
" Cape Verde 2 2011 72 15 20.8% ------
" Dominican Republic 5 2010 183 38 20.8% 5 2010 32 3 9.4%
63 Cambodia 7 2008 123 25 20.3% 1 2012 59 8 13.6%
64 Israel 2 2009 120 24 20.0% ------
65 Estonia 3 2011 101 20 19.8% ------
" Republic of Moldova 11 2010 101 20 19.8% ------
66 Bangladesh 12 2008 350 69 19.7% ------
67 Honduras 11 2009 128 25 19.5% ------
68 Lithuania 10 2008 141 27 19.1% ------
69 Monaco 2 2008 21 4 19.0% ------
" Tajikistan 2 2010 63 12 19.0% 3 2010 34 5 14.7%
70 France 6 2007 577 109 18.9% 9 2011 347 77 22.2%
71 Mauritius 5 2010 69 13 18.8% ------
72 Greece 5 2012 300 56 18.7% ------
73 San Marino 11 2008 60 11 18.3% ------
74 Indonesia 4 2009 560 102 18.2% ------
" Sao Tome and Principe 8 2010 55 10 18.2% ------
75 Madagascar 10 2010 365 64 17.5% 10 2010 164 20 12.2%
" United Arab Emirates 9 2011 40 7 17.5% ------
76 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 12 2010 23 4 17.4% ------
77 Slovakia 3 2012 150 26 17.3% ------
78 Morocco 11 2011 395 67 17.0% 10 2009 270 6 2.2%
" Venezuela 9 2010 165 28 17.0% ------
79 United States of America 2 11 2010 432 73 16.9% 11 2010 100 17 17.0%
80 Turkmenistan 12 2008 125 21 16.8% ------
81 Saint Lucia 11 2011 18 3 16.7% 1 2012 11 2 18.2%
82 Azerbaijan 11 2010 125 20 16.0% ------
83 Gabon 12 2011 114 18 15.8% 1 2009 102 18 17.6%
" Thailand 7 2011 500 79 15.8% 4 2011 149 23 15.4%
84 Albania 6 2009 140 22 15.7% ------
" Republic of Korea 4 2012 300 47 15.7% ------
85 Democratic People's Republic of Korea 3 2009 687 107 15.6% ------
86 Burkina Faso 5 2007 111 17 15.3% ------97
87 Ireland 2 2011 166 25 15.1% 4 2011 60 18 30.0%
88 Zimbabwe 3 2008 214 32 15.0% 3 2008 99 24 24.2%
89 Chile 12 2009 120 17 14.2% 12 2009 38 5 13.2%
" Turkey 6 2011 550 78 14.2% ------
90 Cameroon 7 2007 180 25 13.9% ------
91 Djibouti 2 2008 65 9 13.8% ------
92 Russian Federation 12 2011 450 61 13.6% N.A. 169 8 4.7%
" Swaziland 9 2008 66 9 13.6% 10 2008 30 12 40.0%
93 Grenada 7 2008 15 2 13.3% 8 2008 13 3 23.1%
" Guatemala 9 2011 158 21 13.3% ------
" Niger 1 2011 113 15 13.3% ------
94 Bahamas 5 2012 38 5 13.2% 5 2012 16 4 25.0%
95 Sierra Leone 8 2007 124 16 12.9% ------
96 Chad 2 2011 188 24 12.8% ------
97 Jamaica 12 2011 63 8 12.7% 9 2007 21 5 23.8%
98 Central African Republic 1 2011 104 13 12.5% ------
" Dominica 12 2009 32 4 12.5% ------
" Paraguay 4 2008 80 10 12.5% 4 2008 45 7 15.6%
99 Montenegro 3 2009 81 10 12.3% ------
100 Colombia 3 2010 165 20 12.1% 3 2010 100 16 16.0%
" Uruguay 10 2009 99 12 12.1% 10 2009 31 4 12.9%
101 Syrian Arab Republic 5 2012 250 30 12.0% ------
102 Suriname 5 2010 51 6 11.8% ------
103 Zambia 9 2011 157 18 11.5% ------
104 Romania 11 2008 330 37 11.2% 11 2008 136 8 5.9%
105 Togo 10 2007 81 9 11.1% ------
106 Cote d'Ivoire 12 2011 254 28 11.0% ------
" India 4 2009 545 60 11.0% 1 2012 238 24 10.1%
" Liberia 10 2011 73 8 11.0% 10 2011 30 4 13.3%
107 Japan 8 2009 480 52 10.8% 7 2010 242 45 18.6%
" Jordan 11 2010 120 13 10.8% 10 2011 60 7 11.7%
108 Armenia 5 2012 131 14 10.7% ------
" Cyprus 5 2011 56 6 10.7% ------
109 Antigua and Barbuda 3 2009 19 2 10.5% 4 2009 17 5 29.4%
110 Malaysia 3 2008 221 23 10.4% N.A. 66 15 22.7%
111 Mali 7 2007 147 15 10.2% ------
112 Bahrain 10 2010 40 4 10.0% 11 2010 40 11 27.5% 98
" Barbados 1 2008 30 3 10.0% 2 2008 21 7 33.3%
" Equatorial Guinea 5 2008 100 10 10.0% ------
" Guinea-Bissau 11 2008 100 10 10.0% ------
113 Kenya 12 2007 224 22 9.8% ------
114 Democratic Republic of the Congo 11 2011 492 44 8.9% 1 2007 108 5 4.6%
115 Hungary 4 2010 386 34 8.8% ------
116 Kiribati 10 2011 46 4 8.7% ------
" Malta 3 2008 69 6 8.7% ------
117 Brazil 10 2010 513 44 8.6% 10 2010 81 13 16.0%
118 Bhutan 3 2008 47 4 8.5% 12 2007 25 6 24.0%
" Panama 5 2009 71 6 8.5% ------
119 Benin 4 2011 83 7 8.4% ------
120 Ghana 12 2008 230 19 8.3% ------
121 Ukraine 9 2007 450 36 8.0% ------
122 Botswana 10 2009 63 5 7.9% ------
123 Gambia 3 2012 53 4 7.5% ------
124 Congo 6 2007 137 10 7.3% 10 2011 72 10 13.9%
125 Nigeria 4 2011 352 24 6.8% 4 2011 109 7 6.4%
" Somalia 8 2004 546 37 6.8% ------
126 Saint Kitts and Nevis 1 2010 15 1 6.7% ------
" Tuvalu 9 2010 15 1 6.7% ------
127 Georgia 5 2008 137 9 6.6% ------
128 Maldives 5 2009 77 5 6.5% ------
129 Myanmar 11 2010 428 25 5.8% 11 2010 224 4 1.8%
" Sri Lanka 4 2010 225 13 5.8% ------
130 Haiti 11 2010 95 4 4.2% 11 2010 30 1 3.3%
131 Samoa 3 2011 49 2 4.1% ------
132 Mongolia 6 2008 76 3 3.9% ------
133 Tonga 11 2010 28 1 3.6% ------
134 Belize 3 2012 32 1 3.1% 3 2012 13 5 38.5%
" Iran (Islamic Republic of) 5 2012 290 9 3.1% ------
" Lebanon 6 2009 128 4 3.1% ------
135 Comoros 12 2009 33 1 3.0% ------
" Marshall Islands 11 2011 33 1 3.0% ------
136 Egypt 11 2011 508 10 2.0% 1 2012 180 5 2.8%
137 Vanuatu 9 2008 52 1 1.9% ------
138 Oman 10 2011 84 1 1.2% 10 2011 83 15 18.1% 99
139 Papua New Guinea 6 2007 109 1 0.9% ------
140 Yemen 4 2003 301 1 0.3% 4 2001 111 2 1.8%
141 Kuwait 2 2012 65 0 0.0% ------
" Micronesia (Federated States of) 3 2011 14 0 0.0% ------
" Nauru 6 2010 18 0 0.0% ------
" Palau 11 2008 16 0 0.0% 11 2008 13 2 15.4%
" Qatar 7 2010 35 0 0.0% ------
" Saudi Arabia 2 2009 150 0 0.0% ------
" Solomon Islands 8 2010 50 0 0.0% ------
Source: IPU (2013), “World Classification of Women in National Parliament” Retrieved from http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm
The above tables (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7) affirmed that, Affirmative Action is yet to address the need for re-structuring power structure in order to accommodate and enhance gender balances in the representation of women in federal governance. The low level of women representation from pre-independence to post independence era have called for series of struggle for gender balancing, especially in her representation in federal governance. The poor representation of women which also transcended to the appointment of only 11 Women out of 93 Ambassadors by President Jonathan in 2011 showed the pitiable situation of Nigerian women in politics. All these cumulated to the shameful and disgraceful placement of Nigeria in the international ranking of IPU (2013) as the 127 th country that enhances women participation and representation in politics, this irrespective of her glamorous display as African’s giant in the International community. All these pointed to the fact that, Affirmative Actions in Nigeria have no significant positive impact hence, there is need: for critical review of these federal affirmative actions, and for government to make and implement more stringent gender sensitive policies in order to enhance proper gender representation in federal governance as obtained in some other countries like Rwanda, South Africa, India, France and Sweden.
100
CHAPTER SIX: POLICY ALTERNATIVES FOR WOMEN EQUALITY IN NIGERIA
Promoting gender equality has become a globally recognized and an acceptable reality. Gender matters have equally been identified as vital to the attainment of national development goals. The achievement of gender equality is in fact, not only seen as an end in itself rather an agent of change to, and a sine-qua- non for the attainment of sustainable development. In view of this, Nigeria is said to have made some efforts towards eliminations of gender discrimination in order to enthrone gender parity and human dignity. The national gender policy which replaced and reinforced the previous national policy on women is particularly aimed at the gender inequality problematic in Nigeria. In the face of the above, the history of development policies in Nigeria has somewhat been that of lackadaisical attitude to the gender variable. The first two decades of development planning in Nigeria from 1963. When it became a republic, for instance was largely characterized by gender-blind and gender-insensitive development policies. In same vein, Nigeria, particularly since the wake of the 1980s embraced gender-biased economic policies where women’s interest were subsumed within the national interest and gender sensitivity was almost inconsequential, infinitesimal and a non-issues (Ejumudo, 2013). However given the adoption of Millennium Development Goals by United Nations in 2000, more interest has been generated with special attention towards the pursuit of Gender Sensitive Policies both at Global and National levels. To dismantle the metamorphosed ancient gender inequality syndrome in Nigeria, this battle must implore the amour of professional intelligence, in the sense that, those factors militating against active participation of women in politics such as: financial constraints, patriarchal culture, violence, lack of capacity, electoral malpractice among others should be pulled down, which in return would create free access for adequate gender participation in federal governance. In bid to achieve this therefore, the government introduced some federal affirmative action such as; federal character principle and quota system which their evaluations showed that they lack the major principles and provisions to ensure gender balances in federal governance. Federal Character as a principle has been underscored by the fact that, the issue of appropriate unit of representation, for the purpose of pursuing the goals of the principle has always been on such areas as “state”, “ethnicity” and “defined territorial zones”. As noted by Adujie (2009), federal character ensures that public appointments reflect multi-variables of a multi-cultural, multilingual and multi-religious in other to enhance Nigeria’s 101
National Development. The Constitution of Nigeria, (since 1979 to the present 1999 version) for decades now has made provisions for a quota system and the reflection of a federal character in appointments of public office holders. In light of the above, a close analysis of federal character principles as articulated in different policy and legal documents revealed that, it is not envisaged to have under its ambit the reversion of gender imbalance in public affairs, institutions and even appointments rather it is concerned in reflecting appointments based on state, ethnicity, zones and religion making no provision for gender. As has been proven or reflected in federal appointment since 1999. Thus, even though the federal character principle is, in part, designed to deal with the problem of imbalances and discriminations, it is however, not focused on gender. Therefore, the principle without reforms to a integrate gender into its provisions rightly lacks the capacity to be a tool to redress gender discrimination in the composition and conduct of public institution, appointment and affairs in general. Conceptually therefore, the federal character principle can be broadened to include provisions, which encapsulate gender representation. This could be done by a way of introducing a clause stipulating minimum cut-off point for women representation in certain political offices. However, as observed by Obiyan and Akindele (2002), there may be some problems that may be associated with this legal provision. The fact of rigidity of constitutional provisions is obvious. To ‘constitutionize’ a guaranteed minimum level of participation for women in certain political sphere may make such provision rigid. Rigidity in itself is not necessarily evil. The need for strict adherence to certain provisions may justify the ‘rigidisation’ of such provisions. Furthermore, it may also be argued that to set aside a certain minimum participation level for women may imply sacrificing merit for mediocrity. Rather in backing legalization of quota system, it should be emphatically stated that, the agenda is not to ensure equalization of representation between men and women but to encourage the participation of women in politics. This provision can easily be applied to appointive positions, as against elective positions as argued by some that; legitimating quota system for elective positions may be cumbersome to apply. For instance, if ten percent of the senate is to be filled by women, it could be clumsy to implement since membership of the body is by election. Even if fifteen percent of the candidates presented for election by each political party are women the outcome may not necessarily lead to the emergence of up to ten percent female women. But in appointive political offices, it may be 102 convenient to articulate and implement a specified minimum female representation. On the other hand, quota system has been criticized for limiting the number of women’s representation in politics, as well as compromising merits for mediocrity. Irrespective of different views, there has been lack of affirmative action quota in terms of women’s representation in Nigeria federal governance. Affirmative action is usually a measure intended to supplement non-discrimination; it is a broad term encompassing a host of policies that seek to support “weak” groups in the society. They include policies where deliberate action is used to stop discrimination. A policy process of this type is to allow for rules that have the objective of enhancing equal opportunity for individuals and the improvement, in the situation of marginalized groups. In 1979, the United Nations general assembly adopted the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The convention has been variously described as the “bible of women empowerment” and women international bill of rights. Since its adoption it has become a reference point for the women’s movement in the demand for gender equality. The Convention, According to UNESCO (1999:6) “reflected the depth of the exclusion and restriction practiced against women solely on the basis of their sex by calling for equal rights for women regardless of their marital status in all fields whether, political, economic, social, cultural and civil. It called for national legislations to ban discrimination, recommended temporary special measures to enhance equality in fact between men and women” (cited in Agbalajobi, 1999). Article IV of CEDAW Convention (2008) states that: Adoption by states parties of temporary special Measures aimed at accelerating de facto equality Between men and women shall not be considered Discrimination as defined in the present convention, But shall in no way entail as a consequence the Maintenance of unequal or separate standards; These measures shall be discontinued when the Objectives of equality of opportunity and treatment Have been achieved (CEDAW, 2008: IV).
Similarly, the 1999 Constitution provided Affirmative Action to supplement non-discrimination of contending parties. The Constitution hence provided that; the composition of the government of the federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a 103 manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command loyalty thereby, ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that government or any of its agencies. It is not the use of affirmative action that seemed to be the problem but the practical effects and its linkage to fundamental ideas of fairness and justice. Given same token, there can hardly be a stronger argument for gender based affirmative action than equal representation in a country where women who constitute about half of the population have been continuously sidelined in the public life to the extent that they have never held more than 15% of both appointive and elective offices. The Constitution however, was not specific in ensuring equal representation on gender base unlike the constitution of some African countries like South Africa and Uganda. The Constitution of Nigeria took no cognizance of disadvantaged position of women; and has no provision for gender equality apart from the general reference to non-discrimination on the basis of gender etc. There is nothing in the constitution that is aimed at redressing the disparities that exist along gender lines in Nigeria. On the other hand, the Federal Character Principle, which is meant to ensure equitable representation of states and ethnic groups in national appointments, actually places the women at additional disadvantage by implying that they can only represent their states of origin where culture does not permit a woman to represent her place of birth, she loses a golden opportunity as could be seen in several cases where women’s state of origin disallowed them appointment, and equally their husband’s state refusing to endorse them. In many of these instances as clearly stated by Agbalajobi (2009), the government played safe by appointing a man instead, hence; has continued to consolidate women’s under-representation in national politics. In attempt to overcome women’s under-representation in politics; haven seen the deficiencies associated with present federal affirmative action, it is therefore imperative to consider policy alternatives for women equality in Nigeria. To achieve this, measures targeted at dismantling present impediments to women participation in politics are to be put in place. Hence my recommended policy alternatives include: I) Introduction and implement of a stringent and well defined Women Quota Policy II) Formulation of National Women Social Policy III) Establishment of Gender Equal Opportunity Commission 104
Firstly, Quota policy as an affirmative action principle has worked for many countries that have high percent women representation in National Parliament. Countries like Rwanda and India among others are good example. According to Berit Lindeman, a Scandinavian and Consultant to the International Foundation of Electoral System, “the truth is the success was gained through hard labour from courageous women during a time-span of 80 years and during this period of time, a change in the traditional patriarchal attitude took place. There is not really any magic formula related to the Scandinavian success of around 40 percent representation in parliament. It is true that measures like quotas have been introduced, but only voluntary ones introduced by the political parties themselves and only after the main battles of representation had been won in the 1970s,(Okumephuna, 2009). Form the above statement, quota policy is crucial especially at the onset of gender struggle which would serve as a legal gateway to women into politics. Given the fact that, neither the constitution nor federal character principle clearly defined measures to redress gender imbalances in representation in governance, therefore, there is need to introduce a clearly defined and legally backed quota policy that would ascribe at least 30 percent of both elective and appointive national positions to Nigerian women. This would project them to sensitive positions were they would like Rwandan women participate effectively in the drafting of new constitutions, develop guidelines that guarantee seats of women candidates and also participate in presiding over elections in the country. Quota policy will integrate women into better representation hence, giving them the opportunity to participate in deciding over matters that affect them. This policy should be a national law, implemented and having with it explicit punishment in case of neglect. Political parties in the country should be compelled to subscribe or adhere to this, national quota policy as any party that failed to present at least 30% of female candidates would be denied accreditation by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The recommended quota policy as an alternative policy to women equality should be a law practicable by all government especially federal government institutions throughout the federation. This is by no means, patronizing mediocrity for merit, because the policy should be such that gives prominence to competent and qualified females first, as there are many capable women fit for different political positions whom due to rough political terrain could not ascend 105 to such political offices. Also, the policy by no means should not limit women representation in National Government to any specific percentage rather should encourage women to competitively exceed the quota minimum, as some argue it is a means to stagnant women’s representation in governance. The policy being a legal instrument coupled with its implementation force and power of sanction will be an active federal affirmative action that will not only give women the base, but would escalate their equality or proper representation in national government. It will also be a means to level the playing field. Finally, it should be integrated into Federal Character Principle as a Principle of Federal Character Commission. Secondly, the National Gender Policy should be replaced with National Women Social Policy in order to enable it encapsulate more provisions that would promote gender equality. The replacement is necessary because the name wrongly projects the cause of gender equality in the sense that, the name National Gender Policy reflects a policy that concerns or involves both male and female gender which is inappropriate as the core motive of promoting women equality is hindered or swallowed in the name. The male gender is speedily ahead dominating the whole system hence; encapsulating them into same measure mapped out to enhance women equality underplays the goal of the policy. It is against this background that, I recommend the replacement of national gender policy with national women social policy which depicts an explicit dichotomy in the nomenclature as reflected in the naming of Federal Ministry of Women’s Affairs as against Ministry of Gender Affairs. The 2006 National Gender Policy as an improvement of the 2000 National Policy on Women by the Chief Olesegun Obasanjo’s administration is hereby, recommended to be collapsed or rather should be amended into a policy alternative called National Women Social Policy. However, some key principles of National Gender Policy as stated in FMWASD (2006), could be amended and adopted by the new policy alternative, principle such as: A. A commitment to gender mainstreaming as a development approach and tool for achieving the economic reforms agenda, evidence based planning, value re-orientation and social transformation. B. Recognition of gender issues as central to and critical to the achievement of national development goals and objectives and a requirement for all policies to be reviewed to reflect 106 gender implications and strategies as contained in the gender policy and implantation modalities specified in the national gender strategic frame work. C. Realization that effective and results-focused policy implementation demands a cooperative interaction of all stakeholders. D. Promotion and protection of human rights, social justice and equality. However, the policy alternative should be broadened to accommodate the above principles as well as furnished with elaborate provisions that would enable it actively fight against those social, cultural, economic and political barriers that impede adequate participation and representation of women in federal governance. It should be a policy that would crush traditional patriarchal attitudes of Nigerians; enhance economic and educational empowerment of women; create bullet effect enlightenment about needs for women’s representation in governance; as well as being a follow-up policy for women quota policy. Ensuring it is not only implemented as a national law but, that the government, political parties and all federal government institutions adhere to the quota policy in any given elective, appointive and employment position carried out in the country. To achieve this, there is need to ensure a powerful modality of coordination, networking, monitoring and evaluation of these alternative policies, as this could be done through wielding political wills, adequate funding, prosecution of defaulters, and compulsory annual or quarterly publication of evaluation reports in the dailies and constant reviews of activities. Therefore, if these policy alternatives are welcomed, they will be great instruments to usher in the long needed wind of change, not only to the good of Nigerian women, but to the overall national development of the country as a whole. Lastly, the government should establish a separate commission from Federal Character Commission called the Gender Equality Opportunity Commission whose function would be to ensure that there is gender balance in appointive and elective positions in the country; ensure economic bridge in empowerments of both genders among others. The commission is to squarely face gender matters and make sure that women issues attract adequate government attentions. It should be designed in such a way that it will either have its offices in every state or on zonal basis. However, the national headquarter like that of federal character should be located at the Federal Capital Territory Abuja; having state representing commissioners who would stay in office for a renewable tenure of four years. 107
The Commission however, should work in hand with the Federal Character Commission, both having the gender quota system properly integrated into their different principles, and should be furnished with adequate provisions (principles) and powers to strike and attain their gender balance in the governance especially federal governance of the country.
108
CHAPTER SEVEN: SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
7.1 Summary The Concept “Gender Sensitivity” deals with the ability to recognize gender issues as well as to recognize women’s different social positions and gender roles. Globally, the female gender has been subjected to various sexist stereotyping, discrimination and violence irrespective of the reported record that they produce half of the world’s food, and work two-third of the world’s working hours. Economically, they have just 36% of the total wage employment and only 1/3rd share of the national income (Adegoroye, 2005).
In Nigeria, gender inequality thrived across all sectors which have contributed to uneven development and feminization of poverty. In chapter two, it was noted that among 70% of the population estimated to be living below poverty line, over 65% were projected to be women. In terms of income and purchasing power, men had greater access to high-paying secured employment than women as their estimated income and purchasing power rated 1,495USD against 614USD for women.
Also, the political sector could be described as the citadel of gender inequality in the sense that, the study discovered that the political terrains have been dominated by men therefore, subjecting the women who do not only constitute almost half of the population but have been rated as major voters in Nigeria election, to gross underdevelopment in federal governance. Several militating factors like: financial constraints, violence, socio-cultural practices and weak constituency base among others were unraveled as hindrances to active women participation and representation in politics.
In order to dismantle this, realizing how crucial gender equality is to sustainable national development, the government adopted some gender sensitive policies (AA), signing and ratifying similar international resolutions among others. In the lacuna in literature it was discovered that most researchers or writers concentrated on the poor representation of women in governance, factors militating against women participation in politics among others but neglecting to critically bring to lime light the underline politics behind none implementation of most gender related policies, which if done would stripe off or shrink the political and social domineering status of men in our society. 109
In chapter three, Feminist theory and precisely Radical Feminism was adopted in the analysis. In our Theoretical Application, the study showed that the biological factors or situation of women feeling weak and inferior has played a grave consequence in subjecting them under several sex stereotyping, discrimination and violence by their male folk, and therefore proposed for change in perception. It stated the need for occurrence of radical revolution in order to liberate themselves from these bondages. We used secondary method of data collection, qualitative descriptive analysis and pre-test, post-test research design in our research methodology.
In chapter four, we explained the two views of debates on gender affirmative action. The critics of AA in the debate among other views opined that affirmative action breeds laziness, poor motivation, reverse discrimination, promotion of incompetence against meritocracy. Objecting these, her supporters held that affirmative action promotes women participation in politics, enhance moral commitment, create diverse work environment, empower women and enhance national development. In chapter five, it was discovered that the level of women participation in the society differed ranging from the pre-colonial, colonial and post-colonial era. While women played vital roles in the pre-colonial society, they were highly limited by the colonial administration and in the post colonial system still struggling to claim their rightful position in the society. Remarkable among the three epochs was the existence of gender inequality, although with different inequality intensity.
On effects of affirmative action on gender, the male gender pointed that, it favoured the females therefore the practices were disadvantageous to them. To men, commitment increased as affirmative action practices were perceived as sex neutral or as favouring males, and then leveled off. However, given historical discrimination against women in almost all sectors, the federal government felt it necessary to bridge the gap through introduction of some affirmative action. In chapter five, we observed that none of the laudable affirmative action measures and some other efforts put in place so far by government like : the introduction of federal character principle and quota system, accession to international related women resolutions (such as the 1995 Beijing Conference), creation of Federal Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development and the formulation of National Gender Policy in 2006 among others were able to achieve the goal of addressing gender imbalances in the economic, social and especially in the 110 political sector hence; Nigerian females are still subjugated by the same system that claimed to redress gender inequality.
It was based on this that we discussed some needed policy alternatives for women empowerment and progress in chapter six. We stated the needs to: metamorphose National Gender Policy into a better policy plan of National Women Social Policy; formulate and enforce a stringent Women Quota Policy and; establish a Gender Equality Opportunity Commission. The Federal Character Commission should also be broadened to encapsulate gender quota limit for women representation in federal governance because; the research revealed that some affirmative action like federal character principle lack the capacity to redress gender imbalances in the system because it lacks the provisional capacity to redress gender inequality as its units of consideration for representation have been mainly on the ground or basis of state, religion, ethnicity and defined territorial zones. Also, it was discovered that a legally backed quota system with regards to considering gender in elective and appointive positions have not been in full operation in the country. Hence, against the postulation that quota system and federal character in Nigeria are claimed to be affirmative action, their criticisms rightly showed that, they had neither the claims of intending to redress any discriminations of the past nor the righting of any wrongs committed by one side against the others. It was on basis of the identified inefficiency of federal affirmatives action that we recommended the above policy alternatives which would serve as a formidable basis to enhance proper representation of women in federal governance and in return, would make for over all national development.
7.2 Conclusion Women participation in Nigerian politics is an issue of crucial importance. Women have been put at the background politically for years; this has therefore engendered a consciousness of women under-representation in public life. The study identified some barriers that have hindered active participation of women in governance. Viewed from culture and tradition; women actually face great resistance from participating in politics. Aside the fact that majority of men (husbands) do not allow their wives to participate in politics, a lot of females believed that politics would prevent them from taking absolute care of their families. 111
The issue of violence, thuggery, intimidation and money politics were also the associated hindrances discovered in the research. Nigerian women need more than economic empowerment for success at the polls. Political violence negates women’s chances at the polls and in political participation; women need to collectively say “no” to political violence and violence of all forms. The state on its part should ensure full security of women and girls during election periods and end impunity. Political parties must commit to non-violent campaigning and desist from hate speeches. Non-violence education should be mainstreamed in all awareness raising, and voters education campaigns by all players and the state should guarantee and safeguard freedom of movement, expression and assembly for all citizens especially women. Equally, perpetrators of political violence must be brought to justice in addition to adequate compensation to victims and their families. However, in order to abet this, government introduced some federal affirmatives action. On the general perspective, controversial views have existed over time about affirmative action. Its critics opined it breeds resentment; is a reverse discrimination, brings stigmatization, a compromise of merit for meritocracy, its supporters while on the other hand, believed affirmative action increases opportunity and bridges gap of discrimination among others. As a means of displaying its readiness to incorporate women into political participation and representation, the government has signed and acceded to several international, regional and sub regional treaties related to women resolution. Nationally, some measures have been introduced like: the introduction of National Gender Policy of 2006, establishment of Federal Ministry of Women Affairs And Social Development, launching of Women for Change Initiative, establishment of Federal Character Commission among others. Unfortunately, none of these have been able to achieve the desired representation of women in federal governance. It was therefore concluded from the research that: proper women inclusion in the federal governance is a recipe for a sustainable national development, national security and good governance; until women rise to squarely confront the politics associated with formulating and implementing gender affirmative actions; until those barriers that hinder women participation in politics are dismantled and until Nigeria women rise on their feet to consciously understand, fight and occupy their rightful places in the federal governance, the goal of gender struggle will only, but remain a mirage.
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7.3 Recommendations The struggle for attainment of gender equality is a worthy fight that if achieved, would not only be beneficial to individuals (women and men), but would also, be essential for producing an effective and efficient system both at the macro (federal) and micro (local) levels. Recognizing the sensitive and important nature of gender issues, more professional efforts are needed to ensure that the struggle finally achieve its goals. Therefore, to enhance this, certain efforts are necessary. Drawing inferences from national gender policy situation analysis/ framework the below were acknowledged: Policy Partnership and Programme Reforms- although the government has consistently projected to have affirmed its commitment and support to gender equality and women’s empowerment and progress, the present policy environment across sectors, inter-sectoral cooperation and programming priorities decry this commitment. The seemingly tolerant policy environment, structural arrangements and programme content of line ministries need to be restructured to respond and integrate gender issues. Engendering sector policies, redefining partnership arrangements and re-designing service delivery and other programmes should be a priority for government and its partners. The Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development should be restructured to integrate the new recommendation policy alternative of National Women Social Policy which would enable it deliver its increased mandate; and its delivery mechanism strengthened. Legislation and Human Rights Protection - the fact is that, Nigerian women’s rights are much more ignored and infringed upon at different stages of their lives more than their male counter parts. The existence of tripartite legal system namely; statutory, customary and sharia law operates contradictory evidence procedures which permit trivialization of women’s legal status. The resultant rights violation perpetuates gender inequality and curbs women’s abilities to take part fully in development processes. To redress this, there should be fully integration of human rights protection especially that of women and children; review of laws and legislations and repositioning and strengthening of legal institutions to overhaul laws, body of jurisprudence, structures and procedures as a strategy for mainstreaming and sustaining gender equality and equality principles. Information, Communication and Value-Reorientation- resistance to gender equality in the past has to immensely derived from poor understanding of the implications of gender 113 mainstreaming for all social groups coupled with the failure on the part of gender actors and stakeholders to communicate effectively, the centrality of gender equality in achieving sustainable national development. The government and civil societies should work to enhance and engender the value-reorientation of the masses through the use of appropriate and locally responsive means of communication. Hence, they should employ a systematic effort to improve knowledge levels and to charge attitudes of all citizens on gender equality. The male should be properly re-oriented and woo their support and involvement which is vital to achieving gender parity. Economic Reform and Financial Accountability - women are greatest hit by transition processes mainly because they lack access to vital resources like education, labour, capital, entrepreneurial skills and equally lack control over the use of their valuable time. Therefore, the percentage of women remains predominantly high among the core poor as public financial systems remains impervious to gender concerns. Sustained economic growth and development is essential to poverty reduction, and women’s empowerment is a strategic and effective entry point to reduce poverty level. Unfortunately, the post Beijing efforts of Nigerian government have failed to attract meaningful economic transformation for women because they remained focused at the micro level. Also to ensure that gender equality and women empowerment are entrenched in economic, social and political reforms, it is important that financial accountability with regards to women’s empowerment is institutionalized through gender sensitive budgeting, gender benchmarking and gender impact assessment especially of public financial systems. Capacity Building and Skill Development- dearth of gender technical expertise, inadequate human resources and insufficient skills have plagued the gender and development sector and constrained partners and programme beneficiaries from maximizing development opportunities to the detriment of the overall development of the nation. To redress this, women need to be equipped through skills development initiatives, economic and educational empowerment in order to upgrade them to capable level where they can exhibit competence and the needed capacity to achieve and maintain gender balances in the system. Research and Data-Gender sensitive research is very crucial for development planning as it does not only provide a deeper insight and greater understanding of gender dimensions to development issues, but its results help to demystify traditional norms and practices that are 114 harmful to women, men, girls and boys. Therefore, gender related researchers should be encouraged as their findings could help to correct so many wrongs in the system. Monitoring and Evaluation - one thing is to formulate a policy, another is to implement, monitor and evaluate such policy in order to achieve its given goals. Unfortunately, Nigeria does not have the culture of implementing, monitoring and evaluating policies that was why many signed and ratified international resolutions are yet to be domesticated in the country’s law. This is by no means, no exception to gender issues as the 1995 Beijing Conference Resolution of 35% affirmative action is yet to be implemented in Nigeria. The government needs to change this anti- developmental culture if it must attain a sustainable national development. Various studies by social psychologists and others have indicated the strong importance of ensuring that female’s voice is heard on corporate boards and in politics where crucial decision-making occurs and policy choices are made. It was found that gender differences may be rate valuable in corporate governance, hence; bringing a fresh method to leadership as well as diverse life experiences including knowledge about key constituencies that enhances the quality of discussion. They contended that, women communicate and make decisions differently than men in ways that may be more compatible with the complexity and uncertainty inherent in turbulent environments and that women demonstrate self-sacrificing behaviors more often than men and also are perceived to be more self-sacrificing and other-directed than men. It was further stated that, women law makers are more willing to work on and support women’s issues than their male colleagues (Joan and White, 2009). Many foreign countries have acknowledged the unique features and life experiences thereby have recognized the need to incorporate them into governance. In 2004, Norway instituted a Quota to integrate women into corporate leadership. The Corporate Board Quota mandated that all publicly listed companies have a minimum of forty percent (40%) of either gender on their board, or face the penalty of dissolution. Furthermore, the European Community’s Amsterdam Treaty adopted in 1997, specifically endorsed gender-based affirmative action in employment stating that; with a view of ensuring full equality in practice between men and women in working life, the principle of equal treatment shall not prevent any member state from maintaining or adopting measures providing for specific advantages in order to make it easier for the Represented sex to pursue a vocational activity, or to prevent or compensate for disadvantages in professional careers. 115
The goal of the amendment was to clarify that affirmation action measures was not seen as contrary to EU’s gender antidiscrimination provision. The treaty allowed affirmative action to facilitate the entry of men and women into jobs in which they were under-represented and to remove obstacles, like stereotyping in job selection criteria that disadvantage women seeking employment. However, given the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women, Held in Beijing 1995 parties (governments) to the treaty unanimously adopted the minimum quota of thirty percent women in decision-making positions. In response to the declaration, 101 countries have passed measures that promote women’s political representation, including quotas at the political-party and sub-national levels, constitutional amendments and national election laws. For instance, Portugal Parliament, in August 2006 enacted a Gender-Quota law dictating that, each party’s election list for legislative, local and European elections should include at least 33.3% of women. Similarly France passed a 2000 law called Parity, which mandated that political parties present candidate lists consisting a fifty-fifty female-male candidates. The law has had dramatic effect on local municipal elections where women have obtained near-parity in many positions. In Rwanda, their 2003 Constitution mandated a quota to ensure women’s representation in their National Parliament. Women have been elected to 48.8% of the seats in the Rwandan chamber of deputies, the highest percentage of women in office in any country. Iraq’s Constitution requires that twenty-five percentages of National Assembly Members be women, and in the 2010 election, eighty-two female candidates were elected, exceeding the twenty-five percent quota. Taking a negative tune, in 2006, United States, negatively ranked eighty-third in terms of women in National Legislatures, and by 2008, dropped to eighty-fifth place, as women constituted only 16.8% of those in the 111 th Congress and 24.3% of those in State Legislatures. At the city level, only 17.5% of U.S. Cities with populations over 30,000 had Mayors in 2009 (Levinson, 2012). The case is totally reversed as Nigeria government still lacks behind in fully integrating her women into politics. For the past 27years, election of women into National Assembly has not gone beyond 8.3%. Hence, there is a crucial need to: fully implement the 35% affirmative action; metamorphose National Gender Policy into a better policy plan of National Women Social Policy; formulate and enforce a stringent Women Quota Policy and; establish a Gender Equality Opportunity Commission and to broaden the Federal Character Commission’s Principles to 116 encapsulate gender quota limit for women representation in federal governance in order to give Nigerian women a better place in federal governance which is a recipe to achieving sustainable national development.
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