+SenorRita Ponders 🤔
Today marks the first anniversary of President Tinubu’s inauguration as the President of Nigeria.
In Today’s edition of Senorita, we reflect on the inclusion of women in the governance of the country from the executive to the legislature and the judiciary.
One thing stands out, women are still underrepresented. There are also concerns about how well the current female representatives in the three arms of government guarantee the protection of other women’s rights.
We revert to our first May edition of SenorRita to represent these concerns.
Tinubu Achieves 5% Gender Inclusion in First Year
Women constitute only 5% of the Tinubu-led 3-tier government, falling 30% points short of the 35% affirmative action outlined in his Renewed Hope Manifesto document.
Overall, women are less represented than men in the Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary.
Currently, women constitute only 15% of President Tinubu’s cabinet and just 4% of Senate and House of Representatives members.
This imbalance in women’s representation in politics may increase gender-biased policymaking and decisions in the executive and the parliament, leading to a lack of attention to women’s issues such as gender-based violence, sexual harassment, girl child education, child marriage, and female gender mutilation.
In his Renewed Hope Agenda, Tinubu pledged that his administration would prioritise gender equality at all levels and increase women’s participation in government to at least 35% of all government positions.
Low Female Participation in Parliament
In the last 25 years, there has been a consistent pattern of low female representation in the Nigerian parliament, both in the Senate and House of Representatives.
Under the current administration, women comprise only 18 of 469 parliament members. This is the second-lowest number of women represented in parliament since 1999.
The lowest number of women in the parliament in Nigeria’s history was during former president Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration between 1999 and 2003, with only 15 women out of the 469 members. The highest record is between 2007 and 2011.
Nigeria’s Female Representatives Lowest in SSA
According to the Women, Peace and Security Index (WPS) 2023, the percentage of women in the Nigerian parliament is only 4%, the lowest among the 48 Sub-Saharan African countries on the list.
On the other hand, Rwanda has made significant progress in gender balance in public governance, with women accounting for 54.7% of the Rwandan parliament.