Recently, Anambra Governor’s wife, Mrs Nonye Soludo had a weeklong interactive meeting with Anambra women under different social, political, religious and pro-government groups. The meetings were held in batches and had wives of traditional rulers, community women leaders, and women leaders faith-based organizations such as Catholic Women’s Organization, C.W.O, from the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria, PFN, and women ministries of Anglican Communion in attendance.
Others were wives of members of Anambra State House of Assembly, Commissioners, Transition Committee Chairmen, APGA women leaders and women from pro-government groups. The meetings were Mrs Soludo’s first official solo outing since the inauguration of her husband’s administration in March, this year. It was an important interface filled with engaging moments. The governor’s wife, in her usual in-deliberate humility and emotional receptiveness, brought each of the groups under one roof and ensured to take note of each woman’s suggestion, appeal and concern.
That’s not all. To avoid the formulaic political fervour that overruns such gatherings, Mrs Soludo with strong help from the Commissioner for Women and Social Welfare, Mrs Ify Obinabo, had a careful plan for each meeting; to systemically move it away from the usual convergence of songs and merries, and give the women something worth each minute spent. She also invited experts who took the women through classroom-like sessions on lucrative agriculture and how the women could maximize the existing potential in the regenerative farming system. It was in those sessions that one of the experts, the National Coordinator of Coconut Producers, Processors and Marketers Association of Nigeria, Ambassador Nma Okoroji, opened the eyes of the women to the huge global economic dividends of coconut value chain. That awareness is a follow-up to the coconut farming revolution that the current administration is championing. And, with women occupying the largest percentage of farmers globally, it is expected that they would lead in this movement.
While the Anambra State Commissioner for Agriculture, Dr Foster Ihejiofor and his team spoke about other existing agricultural opportunities and the right farming process, the Managing Director of Anambra Small Business Agency, ASBA, Sir Clement Chukwuka provided a picture of funding and support opportunities available for medium and small scale entrepreneurs in Anambra State that the women can take advantage of. While urging them to go full-time organic in both what they consume and what they plant, the governor’s wife also promised to help any Anambra female farmer with export support if their agricultural proceeds pass the pure organic assessment. The aim, according to Mrs Soludo, is to encourage the women to embrace healthy farming methods, away from the fertilizer and other inorganic planting procedures that endanger health.
Of course, the governor’s wife did not let any opportunity pass on her hygiene and healthy living campaigns. She was emphatic with her message that “if you don’t understand, your body won’t”. This instructive nugget was to ask the women to question whatever goes into their mouths, both the production procedures and make-up of every product. This is because if a consumer doesn’t understand what he or she takes down the stomach, the body as well won’t. Being a long-practising farmer, healthy living and hygiene expert, Mrs Soludo was worried about the spate of diseases and deaths that are caused by unhealthy lifestyles, especially among women and children. The plan is to take the advocacy down to the grassroots and to ensure that every Anambra woman understands the message.
The meeting, deliberately designed to herald this year’s August Meeting, was a platform to exchange ideological capital and give the women a closer and clearer vista to what to centre their discourse on during the annual all-women convergence. Disturbed by the current wreckage of social norms and values in homes and society, Mrs Soludo bared her worry to the women and asked them to take charge of their homes as the heart and conscience of families and societies. She called their attention to the fast rise in cases of domestic violence and abuse of women and children, rape, drug use among youths and children, and different forms of criminality, and warned that if women, especially, do not step up in their domestic responsibilities, there might not be any future left for both the current and next generations.
Written by DANIEL EZEIGWE/
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