from Noah Ebije, Kaduna
World Health Organisation (WHO) Foundation’s Ambassador for Global Health Mrs Toyin Ojora Saraki has described African women as most hardworking gender and as well dedicated to duty.
Mrs Saraki was appointed as the WHO Foundation’s Ambassador for Global Health in January.
The former first lady of Kwara State is a philanthropist and global advocate for women and girls, with a focus on maternal, newborn and child health; ending gender-based discrimination and violence; and improving education, socio-economic empowerment and community livelihoods in Africa.
She is the Founder-President of The Wellbeing Foundation Africa (WBFA), which is a member of PMNCH, the world’s largest alliance of more than 1,000 organisations for women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health and wellbeing.
Mrs Saraki spoke recently on the occasion of International Women’s Day on the theme, “Gender equality today for a sustainable tomorrow.”
The event was coordinated by Mr Léonce Gamai, a media expert with a lead for West Africa.
Shortly before Mrs Saraki spoke, Mr Gamai said: “The Wellbeing Foundation Africa is joining with the PMNCH global alliance for women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health to highlight how persistent disparities caused by gender, disability and age respectively can widen inequities. When the three intersect, however, the negative impact of exclusion is intensified”.
According to Mrs Saraki, “If we are going to access the situation of gender equality across Africa, we must start by applauding the dedication of African women. The African woman not only delivers a trial for Africa, the African woman works daily to contribute her quota every single hour to the development of our Countries and in some countries, we have seen the recognition and respect given to women. In other countries, what we see is that “why Women” some sort of quality, actually on a daily basis. When it comes to the big decision and regulatory framework, all of a sudden A Glass Wall is put in front of the women, I call it a glass wall, not a concrete wall because, we can see the value that equality and equity brings, we can see it through this glass wall, but when we want to reach out and touch it for ourselves, we were allowed to touch it for our children, families, husband, father’s and male partners, but when we want to touch it for ourselves and for our mothers, that is the point a small group of men, I call it a small group of men who are empowered, anybody with such a good relationship with the father we called it patriots, and that is when they remember to rise only to hold the woman down.
“So it’s quite clear, especially what is happening in Nigeria now, but we are going to re-look at the way we engage with the war for gender equality and we are going to have to exercise our voting right actually. We are going to ask our candidates questions before we vote for them, not after we vote for them.
“We would ask them “How do you feel about Gender Equality, How do you feel about Gender opportunity, how do you feel about gender equality for all. Not just for women, even for the disabled, children, aged and adolescent, so it’s clear with the points we have got.
“With the women protest going on in Nigeria, at the National Assembly, the world has quite a bit more work to do, but I’m very confident that Nigerian women are hard-working, they may have been disappointed, but she is undaunted and she would succeed.
“Older People with Disabilities are three times more likely to be denied health care, four times more likely to be treated badly in the health care system and fifty per cent more likely to suffer catastrophe health expenditure. So disability has a higher problem in lower-income countries, where 80% of the people with disability are not counting, though old people with disability face discrimination and are often invisible in policies formulation, but women and girls with disabilities are subjected to double discrimination and this is so because of their gender bias.
“Women and girls with disabilities include those with multiple and intersecting identities across all contexts. Such as ethnic, religious and racial backgrounds. In statuses such as refugees, migrants, asylum seekers and intellectually displaced ones, identities, age and marital status and even those affected with HIV.
“So, the definition of being faced with disability by women and girls are very diverse, it includes physical disability, psychosocial, intellectual and sensory conditions.
“Then when I take it back to Africa, because I think in Africa, we are not really counting for our selves, how many people are actually having a disability, when I was the First Lady of Kwara State, back in 2004, I engaged in a programme that was being run by Mrs Stella Obasanjo, who really focused on helping children with disability, and we were thinking how many people in Kwara State were living with disability.
“For me, I quoted 2,500 available wheelchairs for them, and I remembered, that I wanted to give the wheelchairs out on children’s day, I thought I could find it very difficult who to give the wheelchairs out to because apart from the School of Special Needs in the State, which had about 400 children, of which I adopted to be a beneficiary as my program, I couldn’t see many disabled people around, it was when I held the ceremony, I remembered them and drive out to Ilorin Amusement park, also being the day of handing over back to the government, so I decided to combine the program. I was shocked to see over 2000 children, of people that are in need, I had no idea of this at all that they are taking care of.
“So we need to recognize that the African Culture hide disability, we hide and look after them in the home, but because we are hiding, the disabled ones can not access available facilities. When I saw all the people bringing out disabled children, I was asking them, I didn’t know you have a disabled child and their response was that they never knew how they can access help.
“So we should stop the stigmatization because most of them had no knowledge of who to go to for help or how to access available facilities”.
Asked to comment on what ways does discrimination and exclusion manifest for women and girls with disabilities in Africa, the WHO Ambassador, said: “The systematic powers, coupled with the failure to prioritise the collection of data. The situation around people with disability has perpetrated the invisible within societies as multiple and intercepting Framework, in various aspect of lives. Girls and Women with Disabilities have the lowest school accessibility and other services, they tend to experience negative and hostile altitude among care and service providers, lack of accessible buildings, equipment and transportation, affordability of services, family health and suffer three times the risk of rape and at sometimes survivor of domestic violence and other forms of violence over a long period of time, than women and girls without disability.
“This is also the issue of absence of appropriate sanitation, facilities for girls with Disabilities in schools, including separate and accessible toilets, In addition to lack of education, resources and support for menstrual hygiene which compliment the ability to properly learn to manage their own hygiene, that makes some young girls with disability stay at home and some of them are sent to special needs school. Even when you can mainstream them in regular schools there must be special provisions for them.
“This kind of deprivation can also lead to great violations of rights, such as forced use of contraceptive. Sexual and reproductive health scheme is now being recognized in several countries such as the Convention of the rights of the child, the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women and girls and the convention of the rights of PWDs that are now in practice. Inspire of all this, needs are still being under prioritized. There is a need for a change.
“In the Humanitarian setting, the situation is worsened when conflict and displacement are on the increase. The discrimination PWDs face are high. Protection systems are destroyed, making them more vulnerable to exploitation.
“A survey conducted in two countries from southern Africa reported that the problem of health care system was lack of availability of services, inadequate equipment and also the socio-economic status of the disabilities were actually the socio determinant of increased violence.
“My foundation, the Wellbeing Foundation Africa is focused on preventing blood injuries which may cause a little disability, this we do by improving maternal and child health from the very start, educating the mothers through the Manucare 360 flagship anti-natal and postnatal programmes. This is to enable them access quality health care services and practice Inclusion and accessibility for all”.
Commenting on the theme, “Gender equality today for a sustainable tomorrow”, and the key messages it conveys, she said: “Persons with disabilities need to be empowered, and be engaged meaningfully in all policies and programs of government that affects their well being.
