The Governor of Akwa Ibom State, Udom Emmanuel, said it would be fine to see a woman lead Nigeria as president in future.
“Honestly, I’ll like to see a female president in Nigeria, let’s also see how that will be,” Mr Emmanuel said on Thursday in Uyo when the wives of Nigerian governors visited him at the Government House, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.
Mr Emmanuel, however, pointed out what he considers a snag in such expectation.
“But the problem there is that if we go for (political party) primaries, we hardly see women coming out to contest with us.
“So many governors came out to be president (in the last primaries), I didn’t see first ladies coming out to contest. It could be when we were doing the mathematics, it could be for the sake of a truce, we would have settled for one of the first ladies to be the next president,” he said.
Governor Emmanuel smiled while the audience clapped for him.
The governors’ wives, under the aegis of the Nigerian Governors’ Wives Forum, were in Uyo for their annual retreat.
The Chairperson of the forum, Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi, informed the governor how the forum has been “successful” in its fight against gender-based violence across different states in Nigeria, and their campaign against drug abuse, cancer, and lack of education for the girl-child.
Mrs Adeleye-Fayemi, who is the first lady of Ekiti State, appealed to Governor Emmanuel and other Nigerian governors to let the Nigerian woman have “access to leadership and decision-making”.
“We know that we do great things individually as first ladies of our respective states, but when we come together we create magic. There’s a lot of joy and happiness in doing things together in sisterhood and solidarity.
“We are very thankful to you and your colleagues at the Nigerian Governors’ Forum for heeding our cries as Nigerian mothers and declaring a state of emergency against gender-based violence.
“And since that state of emergency was declared, we have been quietly working behind the scenes to ensure that the issues around gender-based violence are addressed comprehensively in our states,” she said.
Continuing, Mrs Adeleye-Fayemi said: “At the time you all declared a state of emergency against gender-based violence, only 13 states in Nigeria had signed the Violence Against Persons Prohibition Law. Due to the consistent and persistent advocacies of the first ladies, that number has gone up from 13 to 32 as of June 2022.
“Two years ago we had roughly 28 sexual assault referral centres in Nigeria in 17 states. Due to our interventions, by the end of this year, we are going to have at least 40 sexual assault referral centres in another eight states, bringing the number of states with the centre to 25.”
The Akwa Ibom governor promised to continue to support the forum’s campaigns.
“We have set up referral hospitals (for gender-based violence) in each of the 10 federal constituencies (in Akwa Ibom), and they are equipped with ambulances. So no matter what, you must get help at any point in time,” he said.
