By Lillian Okenwa
Balgis Osman-Elasha’s article: Women…In The Shadow of Climate Change, published in The UN Chronicle merely restated a long-standing challenge. In her opinion, “Women represent a high percentage of poor communities that are highly dependent on local natural resources for their livelihood, particularly in rural areas where they shoulder the major responsibility for household water supply and energy for cooking and heating, as well as for food security.”
That was also the position of Dr. Rosemary Chikwendu, Executive Director of My Take Initiative, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO). She observed that women who rely on agriculture and farming for livelihood are now leaving them with little or no means of livelihood on account of climate change.
At a hybrid meeting of the United Nations Non-Government Organisation Committee on the Status of Women (UN NGOCSW) hosted by My Take Initiative in conjunction with the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Dr. Chikwendu who equally posited that her organisation’s study into violence against women and children showed that the injustices meted to women are interconnected with poverty and other societal ills said: “Women find it difficult to leave abusive relationships or marriages for the fear of poverty and sole responsibilities of taking care of their children.”
Speaking at the physical meeting of the event tagged, ‘Interconnectedness between poverty and other societal ills, in the context of climate change’, in Abuja, Chikwendu noted that poverty would make a woman return to an abusive husband. “It is what makes a woman accept settlement rather than pursue justice, and it is what is hindering the participation of women in politics.”
Again she revealed that to mark International Women’s Day, her organisation empowered people living with disabilities and recently helped 20 internally displaced women with wheelchairs. “We provided wheelchairs for some internally displaced women. We are planning on providing 100 wheelchairs for 100 women, and 100 white canes for visually challenged students. In all as part of Vision 100×3, and in commemoration of International Women’s Day, we trained and empowered 20 women in soap making and confectionaries. We also gave out 10 wheelchairs to 10 paraplegics.”
Earlier at this UNNGO 66 Parallel Event, the Executive Secretary of NHRC, Tony Ojukwu, SAN, said Nigeria was among the top three countries with the highest number of poor people. Ojukwu who was represented by his Special Adviser on Human Rights, Hilary Ogbonna, advised that the ongoing constitutional reform should not only target how to conduct elections and how to context elections but should also be a constitutional reform process for the people of Nigeria.
The Senior Advocate further stated that most of Nigeria’s poverty is either caused by state or non-state actors. He expressed displeasure that the same government which renders female victims jobless by demolishing their places of business, uses its security operatives to arrest, hurl them into Hilux trucks over allegations of prostitution, and end up raping them in detention.
The keynote speaker, Prof. Joy Ezeilo, a Professor of Law and former United Nations Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, especially women and children, joined virtually. Ezeilo stressed that poverty “is a cause and consequence of violence against women”, adding that climate change has further exposed women to violence as they try to survive through farming and other menial agricultural practices.
Other online speakers including Prof Luz Estela Ortiz-Nagle, Country Vice President of the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) Mrs. Amina Agbaje, and a host of other dignitaries expressed concern over how climate change, poor economic policies, and gender disparity amongst other factors, are pushing more women into worsening poverty.
Below are photos of the training, presentation of wheelchairs, and donations.
