By John Okafor
*Commissions e-library at Mumbayya House
Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta, the Executive Vice-Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has received multiple honours at the 2022 International Women’s Day for his role in women empowerment in the country.
At a public lecture organized by the Kano Civil Society Forum (KCSF), an umbrella body of over 200 women’s rights groups, in conjunction with the Aminu Kano Centre for Democratic Studies (CDS), Bayero University, Kano, to mark the IWD, which Danbatta chaired, several women groups showered him with awards.
According to Dr. IkechukwuAdinde, the NCC Director, Public Affairs, “while Danbatta was scheduled to present awards to various women who had distinguished themselves in different endeavours, little did he know that the beneficiaries of various Youth Entrepreneur Skills and other empowerment progarmmes of the NCC and his personal charity foundation, Danbatta Charity Foundation (NCF), planned an ambush to present their own prizes to him”.
Also, the CDS, Mumbayya House and KCSF, presented their awards of recognition to the EVC, leaving the NCC boss surprised.
According to Dr. Adinde in a statement, Danbatta he’d earlier told the gathering that he is a strong believer of the potentiality of womenfolk and has never hesitated to entrust responsibilities to his female colleagues because he always found them to be very reliable when assigned with official tasks.
Danbatta said: “I am a very, very strong believer of the tremendous potentiality of members of the womenfolk.
“And they do it with such finesse, not with any aggression like men do.
“Women, by their very nature, are tender. They attend to whatever they are doing with finesse in a very careful manner. And they deliver on targets given to them before deadlines.
“I have never given an assignment to any of the women in the Commission, which was not delivered before the deadline.
“To the extent that, ladies and gentlemen, I am always comfortable to have a woman chair committee, whenever there is a need”.
Danbatta who said that respect for women is natural to him, as it is one of the values his late mum inculcated in him, expressed his delight about the fact that women are now working their way to the top echelon of responsibilities in the country.
“We now have women in every sector of the economy, in every area of human endeavour.
“We have them as engineers, medical doctors, seasoned administrators, name it.
“In the commission I am heading we have four female directors: The Director of Zonal Operations is a woman. The Director of Policy competition, and Economic Analysis is a woman, and also a lawyer.
“Equally, the Director of Legal and Regulatory Services is a woman, and lastly the Director of Projects.
“And I am not saying this out of any disrespect for the womenfolk. Far from that.
“Importantly, more than 50% of the workforce in NCC is made up of women”.
Danbatta added that the NCC has put, in the front burner, the need to expose girls and young women to more opportunities in the digital ecosystem, in line with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) resolution 70, which advocates gender mainstreaming and promotion of gender equality, as well as the empowerment of women through information and communications technology (ICT).
The EVC later commissioned an e-library at the Aminu Kano Centre for Democratic Studies, an arm of Bayero University, which was donated by the NCC in line with the federal government’s commitment to the promotion of digital economy programmes.
