Stakeholders in the health sector have renewed calls for gender equity in healthcare leadership, stressing the need for more inclusive representation in decision-making positions across the health system.
This call was made in Abuja on Wednesday during the graduation ceremony and gala night of the EmpowerHer Fellowship, organised by Women in Global Health Nigeria.
According to the World Health Organisation, the health and care sector is a major source of employment globally, particularly for women, who in 2020 made up 67.2 per cent of workers in the sector worldwide.
The WHO noted that the relative attractiveness of the sector to women in paid employment offers clear opportunities to drive women’s economic empowerment.
The global health body stated that ensuring women’s health and care workers are adequately valued, supported, protected, and promoted is central to achieving the targets set out in its Global Strategy on Human Resources for Health: Workforce 2030 and the Working for Health 2022–2030 Action Plan.
The EmpowerHer Fellowship is a one-year funded programme, from which only 24 women were selected for the inaugural cohort.
The programme featured four major training streams, including advocacy, research, leadership, and personal branding, and the strategic use of social media for influence. While all fellows received advocacy training, they were further grouped into specialised tracks to deepen their skills.
The fellows included researchers, university lecturers, health advocates, and senior health professionals, highlighting the programme’s impact in breaking gender barriers in healthcare leadership. Beyond training, the fellowship also focused on mentorship, visibility, and confidence-building.
In her welcome address, the Co-founder and Chapter Lead of Women in Global Health Nigeria, Dr. Peju Adeniran, said the fellowship was designed to address the exclusion of women’s voices from leadership spaces.
‘This fellowship responds to the status quo in which not enough women have their voices in the room. When the voices of women are not in the room, we fail to utilise at least 50 per cent of our talent pool. We miss the perspectives, viewpoints, and unique contributions that women bring.
‘Our response through this fellowship is to support women who are already doing the work but may lack clarity or confidence about how to amplify their impact. This platform helps them leverage their work. This is a place where we see you, where we invite you to see yourself, and where we support you to build confidence’, she added.
In her keynote address, the Senior Country Director of Pathfinder International Nigeria, Dr. Amina Dorayi, charged the fellows to be resilient, visionary, and vocal, stressing that women’s leadership in healthcare is not optional but essential to building a strong and resilient Nigerian health system.
She explained that resilience should not be mistaken for silent endurance.
‘Tonight is not just a celebration; it is a declaration that women’s leadership in health is not optional. It is essential to the strength, resilience, and future of Nigeria’s health system.
‘True resilience is not about enduring injustice quietly. It is about holding your ground when it would be easier to step back, refusing to compromise your values, and returning stronger and more prepared’, she said.
Also speaking, the Project Officer at Women in Global Health Nigeria, Bukola Shaba, explained that the EmpowerHer Fellowship was designed to address the persistent leadership gap faced by women in the global health space.
According to her, Women in Global Health Nigeria is part of a global movement and has been advocating since 2020 for gender equity in health, particularly in leadership and policy-making roles.
‘Women deliver about 70 per cent of healthcare services globally, yet they are missing from leadership positions. The EmpowerHer Fellowship was created to raise a new crop of visible, confident, and well-equipped women leaders in global health’, she said.
Although the graduation marks the end of the formal training phase, she noted that mentorship will continue into the first quarter of the coming year, and all fellows will remain active members of Women in Global Health Nigeria.
On the broader issue of gender equity, she emphasised that the challenge extends beyond leadership to areas such as career progression for community health workers, who are predominantly women but often lack clear pathways to advancement.
‘One of the areas we focused on from the beginning was community health workers. We realised that most community health workers are women, yet many of them do not have clear paths to leadership.
‘We carried out advocacy visits to the National Primary Health Care Development Agency and engaged senior leaders to explore how these women can be better integrated and trained. We also organised training sessions for community health workers.
‘Policy change does not happen overnight, but consistent advocacy, collaboration, and awareness can shift the narrative. When women are empowered and equipped, health systems become stronger and more equitable’, she stated.
One of the fellows, a veterinarian and One Health advocate, Dr. Bolanle Akanbi, said the fellowship has expanded her capacity to drive change beyond her primary profession.
Dr. Akanbi emphasised that although she is a veterinarian, her passion for women’s health made the fellowship particularly relevant to her work.
‘I am interested in women’s health, and the fellowship has equipped me to combine my baseline profession with collaborations involving medical professionals, microbiologists, journalists, and others to create more impact in women’s welfare, mental health, and reproductive health.
‘I am not only treating animals; I also work with women who rear animals to educate them on how infectious diseases can spread and how proper animal care can improve their well-being, income, and mental health’, she added.
