The Kogi state Director of National Orientation Agency, (NOA), Ambassador Abdullahi M. O, has promised that his Agency will collaborate with the Renaissance Care and Empowerment Foundation, (RECEF), in it’s drive to ensure greater Women participation in politics.
Ambassador Abdullahi stated this in his office on Tuesday when members of the organization paid him an advocacy visit to sensitize the agency on it’s project, tagged, ‘Women’s Participation in Election as voice for Development (V4D) in kogi state.
He called for synergy between his agency and other stakeholders, particularly RECEF, so as to achieve the objective of the V4D project in the state.
He encouraged women to always support their own in elections and encouraged them to go into elective positions, saying that is the only way their voices can be heard in decision that affects them.
The Director also advised politicians to avoid utterances that can heat up the polity, adding that they should rather engage in campaign of issues rather than preaching violence and hate.
According to him the agency is already campaigning against vote buying, violence and voting right ahead of the 2023 election.
Earlier the Executive Director of RECEF, Ambassador Idris Ozovehe Muraina, informed the agency that the main objective of the project is to engage stakeholders on ways of Preventing violence against women in election and ensure that Women turn out on the day of election as a way of showing their political strength.
According to him, women accounted for about 50% of registered voters in Nigeria, but regretted however, that in the 2015 gubernatorial election in kogi state, women accounted for only 35% of accredited voters.
He noted that more worrisome is the revelation that the figure declined to 29%, which he said was only 17% in 2019, saying that this trend has to change in future elections.
“This worrisome trend means that a significant and important part of the population’s voice is not being heard sufficiently in the democratic processes of the nation.
According to him, research have also shown that this trend is highly attributable to electoral violence against women in politics.
Expectedly, the project is working towards reducing reported incidences of electoral violence against women in politics during the General elections in kogi state by march 2023.
In addition, the campaign will also lead to increase women participation over the 2019 record in the forthcoming gubernatorial election by the end of 2023 general election in the state.
In her remarks, the Executive Director, Challenged Parenthood Initiative, (CPI), Eunice Abimbola Agbogun, stressed that the passage and signing into law of Violence Against Persons Prohibition (VAPP), law by the Governor of kogi state and the new electoral law will help greatly to reduce violence against women in the coming elections.
RECEF is a non governmental, not for profit making, non religious and non partisan registered organization, established to improve the welfare of the people in the areas of legislative advocacy, health, education, vocational training, women empowerment and conflict resolution with focus on children, women, youths and other vulnerable groups.
The project is supported with funding from the Government of Ireland