By Daniel Tyokua
President, Helpline Foundation for the Needy Abuja, Dr Jumai Ahmadu has sought protection of Widows across the globe.
She specifically called for implementation of the Violence Against Persons Prohibition ACT(VAPP ACT) and property rights for widows in Nigeria.
In an interview in Abuja, she said would prevent widows from some sorts of hardships, ill-treatment, and injustices they suffer, that threatens their survival, dignity and well-being.
The Violence Against Persons Prohibition ACT, VAPP ACT, was enacted in 2015 to mitigate gender-based violence and human rights abuses in Nigeria.
“Government should do more in terms of enforcement so that widows rights can be highly protected. If we need to have a separate Executive Order, signed and backed up with all it takes for their rights to be protected, in the case when their husbands die, the property should just be left for these women.’
“Family members should not quander the property of late relatives, By all means, if a woman is responsible enough, everything the husband left should be bequeathed to her for the welfare of her children,” Ahmadu said.
The United Nations recognizes these challenges and injustice these widows face and seeks to address them by setting aside June 23rd every year, as International Widows Day to raise awareness.
According to Dr. Ahmadu, Nigeria has beautiful protection laws, but the implementation is where the problem lies.
Dr Ahmadu raised concerns that many widows particularly in the African society suffer a lot of stressful situations from in-laws and relatives, and pointed out that effective implementation of these laws would go a long way to protect the widows from wicked inhuman and cultural practices.
She noted that most of the practices are oppressive and humiliating as they affect their health and ability to function physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually in any environment.
According to her, many of these widows suffer maltreatment ranging from isolation, violation of their human rights, dispossession of property, wicked cultural practices like bathing the corpse for the widow to drink as well as being forced to shave their hair.
Others are subjection to long periods of mourning, or even being chased out of the husband’s house in some cases, a situation that leads some of their children to drop out of school.
“Beyond the talk, let’s ensure that this widows are empowered through the instrumentality of government. Nigeria has all the enabling laws and policies, but the challenge we are having is enforcement. What government can do beyond just protecting them under the VAPP ACT is for the government to ensure that there is a task forceforce,
“Thankfully, the current Minister of Women Affairs is thinking along that line, to have a task force that will be able to swiftly attend to cases of violence, or a widow being violated by her In- laws, so when this task force is in place, it means the policies are going to be implemented, and if there is any default, people are going to be held accountable,”
she noted.
Speaking on the theme, “Widows for Peace through Democracy”Dr Jumai Ahmadu who has been in the business of caring for the less privileged in the past two decades, stressed the need for Government and all wealthy Nigerians to support the empowerment of widows to make them self- reliant.
” First of all, I like to thank the United Nations for setting out a day specifically to recognize the plight of widows and draw attention to Government around the world, Government should do more, to ensure that the rights of widows are highly protected.
” You know that democracy is government of the people, by the people and for the people. It means the widows shouldn’t be left out. So, any widow that has the leadership capacity should be encouraged by her community, family, women and the country at large to take up that leadership position, so that she will be able to have a say in policy formulation or participate in democratic processes” Ahmadu said
She was of the opinion that when the widows are actively engaged, including political participation, they get busy and tend to forget some of their worries.
A widow, Miracle Adebayo, appealed to Government to come to their aid, and pointed out that empowerment of the less- privileged widows, will help them to cater for their children with ease and reduce the number of out of school children .
“When you take away property left for the widows, they don’t have something to rely on, most of our challenges as widows is lack of financial support to start a business and lack of academic support for the children, house rent, so Government should help any widow in this situation and rescue their property back for them” Miracle said.
Another widow, Felicia Onah, narated her ordeal :
“The wahala of widows no be small thing, especially when they are not from the same village. As a widow, I suffered loneliness and a lack of help from my my husband’s people, and the only property he has was taken by his people. So many other widows are suffering the same injustice across the country. The government should help ” Felicia posited .
Also, Janet Yilluk who explained that she suffered both emotionally and psychologically being a widow, said beyond empowerment, government
should create an enabling environment for widows to meet and rub minds, organize seminars on effective resource management, and monitor them to ensure that they are not depressed by circumstances or suppressed by relations.
Founder of Helpline, Dr Ahmadu, however, expressed regret that some few irresponsible widows, hand over their husband’s property to their next husband, leaving their children to suffer.
“But we have isolated cases of irresponsible widows, that as soon as their husbands passed, one man will just come and deceive them, and they will hand over all the property to the man, and the children will now be left to be suffering . In my experience with some widows, I have witnessed two or three of these cases here in Abuja”.
She therefore advised all widows to be empowered educationally, mentally, develop the spirit of “I CAN DO IT”, live above their situation, be determined, acquire skills, stay healthy ,focused, strong and be committed to effectively manage the resources left behind by the man to train their children.
