Skirts in the Boardroom
Gender equality and the empowerment of women in the society has been a goal that has existed for decades considering religious and social standards, a woman is said to be weaker than a man. Other common expressions in use are: “weaklings”, “must be submissive”, “helper ”, “home make/keeper ”,“sex machine“, “baby makers ”, “skirts in the boardroom’.
Also, in the professional world, when some professions are mentioned, the gender that comes to mind is the female gender. Some of these professions are: secretary, hostess, sales representative, caterer, teacher, among others. All these aforementioned can be said to exist at a time. Better said, exist at its minimum in recent times. Even the language of adverts is better these days. Some of us can still remember the UBA jingle. (Wise men bank with UBA…) that was later modified to (wise men bank with UBA, wise women too with UBA…). Gender equality and women empowerment, (MDGs Goal Three) where are we in Nigeria?
This piece will discuss three generation of women, their activities, experiences, passions, and future. For easy reference, the first generation, I call the grand-mothers, the second generation will take the position of the mothers, while the third generation I call the daughters. The first generation is the successor of women of ancient times. They had few opportunities and made good use of what they had. These are the generation that spoke in their time and said a capital “NO” to female suppression. In fact, they laid the foundation for the feminist movement that some women modified as “womanism”. These generations cleared the path for what we have today as the sexist language where women are put into consideration in daily conversation. Part of the joy of existence is communication; these group of women said no to suppression in a society where the voice of a woman is unheard, where the double standard exist, where women were sex objects, where women were the property of a man, where a woman dare not talk when a man talks, where a woman dare to say no, a world of no recognition for the identity of a woman. To mention but a few of these women were Olufunmilayo Ransome-Kuti and Eniola Soyinka (wild Christian).
These women damned the consequences, refused to be kept mute for life ,liberated the posterity and allowed history to absolve them.
Suppression continued ever after the generation of the grandmothers but they had already set the pace of speaking up, they set the pace of expressing the identity of a woman and the struggle against female oppression was actively championed in their time.
The mothers, that is, the second generation of women saw the great value in education, went for it, in a world where education was considered only for the male gender. They strived to be at their best. These brought out their voices that have been silenced for a long time. I salute their courage.
These women are found in all professions as lawyers, doctors, professors, engineers, linguists, and accountants and are active in their profession. Now, we have ladies in the boardroom, also as head of various units in organizations, vice-chancellors in universities, presidents of professional bodies and even pastors in churches. It is an awesome shift, isn’t it?
These women, because of the knowledge they have acquired could carry–on with the struggle on female suppression. To mention but a few, we have, Professor M.E.M. Kolawole, Prof. Alele-Williams (First Nigerian Female Mathematician and Vice-Chancellor), Prof. Dora Akunyili, Dr. Obi Ezekwesili, Dr. Ngozi Okonji-Iweala, Chimanda Adichie, Prof. Adedoyin (who composed the national pledge), Erelu Olusola Obada, Kofoworola Bucknor, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, amongst others. They are part of the feminist movement. Women can now do what a man can do even much better based on the performance of these women that brought about their recognition as women of substance. They have complemented the beauty of an African woman with the knowledge pursuit. When some women took the feminism movement from the radical point of view, which turned them into anti-male, some other women that have a good sense of the balanced and fulfilled woman came up with the movement called “womanism”. “Womanism” says no to female suppression and believes in gender equality. Womanism is not anti-man, they are not haters of men, but believe that both sexes should work together to have a better world to exist in. Both the man and the woman take care of the home (family relationship), they put heads together to have the best in the work environment, in the various religions, men and women have their roles to play, even in the politics of the nation, we have female ministers, and female deputy governors, for example, Erelu Olusola Obada in Ogun State and Mrs. Sarah Sosan in Lagos State.
More so, the third generation that is, the daughters are the up-coming young feminine minds that see the sky as the starting point. They see themselves as beautiful within and without, their shoulders are tall and heads are high. They can only see the best coming their way. They are carrying on the battle of identity consciousness. Now, we have better expressions describing a woman. For example, “what a woman cannot do, only God can do it”, “a woman of substance”, “epitome of beauty”, “quintessence of excellence”, “rare gem”, and so on. Also, the rate of teenage pregnancy has steeply reduced , teenage marriage barely exist, we now have NGOs championed by men and women of understanding e.g. Society for Family Health (SFH), Association for Reproductive and Family Health (ARFH), e.t.c. minding the good growth and development of both male and female children and educating adults on how to lead a better life. In fact, from a recent survey of a senior secondary school in Lagos: Aguda Grammar School. The data we have below is that of boys and girls in the school through the three levels of senior secondary education in four years.
2005/2006 Session
| Boys | Girls |
S.S.1 | 214 | 330 |
S.S.2 | 224 | 227 |
S.S.3 | 170 | 167 |
Total | 608 | 724 |
2006/2007 Session
| Boys | Girls |
S.S.1 | 244 | 355 |
S.S.2 | 300 | 270 |
S.S.3 | 190 | 195 |
Total | 734 | 820 |
2008/2009 Session
| Boys | Girls |
S.S.1 | 383 | 309 |
S.S.2 | 339 | 317 |
S.S.3 | 221 | 196 |
Total | 943 | 822 |
2009/2010 Session
| Boys | Girls |
S.S.1 | 340 | 404 |
S.S.2 | 350 | 354 |
S.S.3 | 250 | 304 |
Total | 940 | 1162 |
From the data above, the level of female education is encouraging, it tells us how far, we have come in achieving the MDGs goal three (3), i.e. “promote gender equality and empower women” in Nigeria. This gives us the hope that more would be achieved in the nearest future. Then we can talk not only of the skirts in the boardrooms but also stilettos at the core of business.
