The Federal Government is working with the National Assembly to ensure inclusion of women’s economic development and financial inclusion in the ongoing constitutional review in Nigeria as this will strengthen and empower the 49.32 percent of critical Nigeria’s population and entrust inclusive development of the country.
This was disclosed at the 2021 training of women cooperatives from the Nigeria for Women Project states by the Minister of State Labour, Mr Festus Keyamo.
The workshop, which is in collaboration with the Michael Imodu National Institute for Labour Studies (MINILS), and the development Research and Projects Centre (dRPC), under the Partnership for Advancing Women’s Economic Development in Nigeria, is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
The minister also commended President Buhari for his interventions through the economic inclusion policies that have strengthen women and their interest
He said the collaboration with the dRPC to empower women cooperatives is key to placing the women in a position to demand for a better intervention by government at the national and sub national segment of government.
He then urged the participants to commit totally to be able to develop action and plans to enable them advocate for women’s economic empowerment.
35 women cooperatives from the Nigeria for women states of Kebbi, Abia, Niger, Ogun, and Taraba are attending the 3-day workshop on advocacy and communication skills designed to empower women to conduct advocacy to duty bearers for advancing women businesses, constituency mobilization, and coalition building, as well as messaging, communication strategies, and leadership strengthening and management of women economic collectives in Nigeria.
In his welcome address, the Director General of the institute, Comrade Issa Aremu, disclosed that the institute supports wholeheartedly the advocacy of the federal government to review of the 1999 constitution to capture women’s participation and gender equality in leadership and decision-making positions. He added that only inclusive economic empowerment can ensure sustainable political inclusion of women.
In his keynote address at the workshop, dRPC coordinator, Dr Yahaya Hashim, said the centre trained over 500 CSOs have so far since 1994, adding that working with women economic collectives is an opportunity to strengthen a critical sector of Nigeria’s population to be able to demand for improvement in their lives in Nigeria.
The 3-day workshop is expected to empower the women cooperatives to build their skills on advocacy and communication to demand for more participation and access to economic development through inclusive policy development and implementation at the national and subnational levels.
