Musawa: Equal Opportunities Abound for Girls with Consistency
Kuni Tyessi in Abuja
Minister of Art, Culture, Tourism and Creative Economy, Hannatu Musawa, has stated that equal opportunities exist for girls just as it is for boys in Nigeria’s patriarchal setting, however, with a level playground been centered on consistency.
She said organisations should invest more building capacity programmes that will have the girls as key focus, while noting that the area of interest lies in the ability to engage them in some training as that is where they are going to get the expertise to be able to flourish within a specific industry.
Speaking as the keynote speaker in Abuja yesterday during the second edition of the State of the Nigeria Girls’ Summit (SONGS) under the auspices of the Ministry of Women Affairs in partnership with development partners including Plan International and UNFPA, Musawa said women and girls can be anything they want to be with the enabling environment being prepped for them.
Revealing the long-term goals in her 8-point agenda for her ministry which she said is based on public private partnership which has a large spectrum on which the girls can flourish, she encouraged them to emulate the likes of the Director General of the World Trade Organisation, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations, Amina Mohammed.
She said, “There is so much equal opportunity for girls and women to be able to achieve anything that they want to and you know in Nigeria now, we want to operate an enabling environment to make sure that girls have that equal opportunity and that they have so many people to look up to. There are the likes of Ngozi Okonjo–Iweala, Amina Mohammed. So when you are consistent and committed, there is nothing that you cannot achieve. What I see is the future of Nigeria.
“I can speak about my industry. What we are doing is putting up structures that will give that equal opportunity for them. It’s all about consistency. Life will never be easy, people have to be committed and consistent and more than anything, they have to be patriotic. One you have patriotism and all that you do are for the betterment of the nation.
“We are working to ensure that we put an environment for them that will ensure and give them a better future. It’s about a long-term future of Nigeria and not just immediate and this has to be sustainable.
“They should also try to engage in capacity building programmes. In my ministry we have that programme as well as that of tourism industry and across board in almost every ministry you have that. The area of interest lies in the ability to engage them in some training, capacity building programmes. That is where they are going to get the expertise to be able to flourish within that specific industry.
“One of my 8-point agenda is about PPP. Everything that we do is about public private partnership, and we bring in private partners to engage and partner with us and this is what we plan to do which is setting up a structure that encourages and within that construct, we will be able to engage some of the young women. With this there will be better opportunities.”
The biennial event is girls-led advocacy platform to present key findings on the state of the Nigerian girl and key questions to stimulate accountability among duty bearers towards promoting the rights of girls in Nigeria.
