Ninety-six per cent of women who contested for various positions in the just concluded 2023 general elections lost to their male counterparts, according to Daily Trust.
Across the country, 1,553 women were on the ballot for the presidential, governorship, national and state assemblies’ elections held on 25th February and 18th March, and the supplementary poll on 15th April. This was unlike the 2019 elections when 2,970 women contested for various positions across the country.
Out of 15,307 candidates of the 18 registered political parties, 1,553 were females (10.1 per cent). But only 72 women got elected at federal and state levels.
Seven of the 72 victorious women were elected as deputy governors – Dr. Hadiza Balarabe (Kaduna), Hon. Josephine Piyo (Plateau), Dr. Akon Eyakenyi (Akwa Ibom), Dr. Ngozi Nma Odu (Rivers), Engr. Noimot Salako Oyedele (Ogun), Hon. Patricia Obila (Ebonyi) and Prof. Kaletapwa Farauta (Adamawa).
Seventeen of the women made it to the National Assembly – three in the Senate and 14 in the House of Representatives – while 48 are members-elect of state houses of assembly.
Many female candidates explained to Daily Trust their inability to coast to victory at the polls.
Jigawa State’s Binta Umar, the lone governorship candidate of the Action Alliance in the country, blamed the situation on lack of cooperation by fellow women, saying “the population of women is enough to give you the winning votes”. Although she was said to have joined the Peoples Democratic Party weeks before the election, her name was on the ballot.
She noted that money is an integral part of politics. “If you have money, you win elections; if you don’t have money you will lose no matter how you try”.
While highlighting culture and religion as factors that played in situation, Umar advised women not to give up contesting for elections even if they fail.
The Labour Party governorship candidate in Rivers State, Beatrice Itubor said that she is in court to reclaim what she tagged, “stolen mandate”.
She said that the use of money and violence during the elections should be totally condemned. “Violence and money politics are the two banes. They brandished ill-gotten money to edge us out. They know people are vulnerable because those in government have ‘weaponised’ poverty and they are using that weapon against everybody”, she said.
Khadijah Iya Abdullahi, who contested for the governorship in Niger State under the All Progressives Grand Alliance, attributed her failure to electoral irregularities. She said: “Massive vote buying, collusion with the Independent National Electoral Commission and security officials, even our party officials at the polling units and collation centres were in bed with the highest bidder; these were all that affected our success.
“Other factors that also affected us from our internal processes are paucity of funds and resources to implement key strategies that we wanted to do”.
Moving forward, she advocated strict adherence to electoral guidelines and rules, which she feels would act as a shield for women against intimidation.
“Most women cannot compete with these fraudulent ways of electioneering and most stay away afterwards thus the decline.
“So what should be done basically is if we remove all the above mentioned issues and there should be support for women financially, mentorship and capacity building it will go a long way in ensuring that women win elections”, she said.
Hajiya Fatima Abubakar, the governorship candidate of the African Democratic Congress in Borno State, said paucity of funds hindered her success.
“You cannot run your campaigns and other expenses without money”, she lamented.
She said women are ready to support and vote for each other, stressing that if all variables are in place women will perform well during elections.
In 2019, INEC had announced that out of the 2,970 women on the ballot for the general elections, only 62 got elected to various positions, which means 97 per cent failed in their bid.
In 2019, there were four female deputy governors elected, 40 women elected in the 36 state assemblies while 18 made it to the National Assembly.
Although female representation in Nigerian politics measured far below global and regional standards, the number of women in the legislature saw a slight increase between 1999 and 2007 from 2.3 per cent to 7.8 per cent.
A political analyst at the Bayero University, Kano, Prof. Kamilu Sani Fagge attributed the African tradition as a major factor to low participation of women in politics, which he says is closely related to religion.
He added that the lack of political awareness among the women also contributed to their inability to win elections, “women have a large population, but they don’t actually work as a group, mostly for petty reasons, when it comes to elections they hardly vote for a fellow woman.
“And the women have some kind of psychological inferiority that they do not come out to contest, they rather want to be given certain quotas, but in politics, in democracy, in anything in life you strive hard to liberate yourself than to sit down and say you want it on a platter of gold”, he said.
He advised women to be more politically conscious, adding that the political awareness would help them to win elections.
He further decried the capital intensive nature of politics in Nigeria, which he said leaves women at a disadvantaged position.
However, the Director of the Centre for Democracy and Development, Dr Idayat Hassan said that violence and vote trading were among the factors that affected the chances of women in the 2023 elections.
“Women are psychologically more averse to violence and would likely distance themselves from a violent ridden process. Unfortunately, the 2023 general elections was yet another that was characterised with a high level of political violence both online and offline”, she said.
She added that the chances of women at the polls can be increased by amending the constitution to provide for gender friendly legislations, eradicating violence in elections as well as curbing the negative use of money in elections alongside providing financial empowerment for women seeking elective positions.
On the implication of fewer women in governance, an associate professor of Political Sociology at the University of Abuja, Abubakar Kari said that the situation is not good for the country, as it places it against the global trend of more women in politics and governance.
“This is a disaster for political inclusion, because ordinarily, we were hoping that there will be more women in elective positions but for this whooping percentage to lose, it’s a big setback for all the attempts and campaigns to ensure that more women attain elective positions. But it also shows the overwhelming dominance of the political process by men, already we belong to a patriarchal society, and so it further entrenches patriarchy in politics”, he said.
Credit: Daily Trust
