Osinbajo, Kebbi First Lady Call for Adequate Investment in Girl-child

By Sunday Okobi

In order to vigorously tackle challenges often faced in the Nigerian society, the wife of the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Mrs. Dolapo Osinbajo, has stressed the need for adequate investment in the girl-child education.

Mrs. Osinbajo made the call in her address at the two-day Mass Literacy for Less Privileged and Almajiri Initiative (MALLPAI) Foundation 2021 Literacy Day with the theme: ‘Promoting Literacy for better education in Nigeria’ recently in Abuja.

Also, the wife of Kebbi State Governor, Hajiya Aisha Bagudu, who is also founder and initiator of the non-governmental organisation, MALLPAI, used the occasion to call for adequate investment in the proper education of children to keep them away from crime.

Osinbajo decried the situation where the girl-child appeared to lag behind the boys in education and many other areas, saying more needs to be done to bridge the gaps in education between female children and their male counterparts.

In her speech, she said: “When a girl is educated, she can read and write; when she is educated, she is aware of the law, she knows love and when her signs say danger.

“When a girl is educated, she is aware of her potential; she can read about Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala of the World Trade Organisation (WTO).

“An educated girl sitting on a chair in Kebbi State or Kano State, in Osogbo or Oshodi; in Awka or Uyo, understands norms, and expands her mind.

“She is not a doctor, but knows a bit about medicine because she can read; she is not an engineer but she knows a bit about buildings and how machines work.

“An educated girl achieves her potential, so it relies on all of us when we limit her in any little way.

“Imagine if Dr. Stella Adedavor, the late doctor, was never educated, and imagine if Nana Asamoah, a poet, was never educated.”

She lauded MALLPAI Foundation’s efforts to provide meaningful life to the girl-child to be apt in achieving the desired goals, and stated that more needs to be done to ensure education is assured for the girl-child.

Corroborating Osinbajo, Mrs. Bagudu explained that “when MALLPAI started with Almajiri, we had challenges then and even now because many people do not see such children, they just see a nuisance, but for us, we see the child not the nuisance, we do not see through such children, we see them as human beings, and some of them have started working, while some have come back to work with MALLPAI Foundation.”

The Kebbi State first lady disclosed that as a mother, the majority of her children are girls, and “the mistake we all make is to think that by educating our children alone and not educating others, we are doing better, but we are not.”