It is another month of August when women gather in churches, communities and at different levels to take stock and find solutions to common societal challenges. They outline ideas and begin to implement them to guarantee a society that is built on strong morals and family values – a society that is progressive and development driven.
Women are critical stakeholders in social development in the Igbo society. From their micro units at community levels as Ụmụ Ada, Ụmụ Ọkpụ, Ndi Iyom Dị, Otú Ụmụ Ọdụ and many others to the larger groupings that became the norm in colonial and post-colonial Nigeria, women remain catalysts of infrastructural development and conscience police of their various communities and churches. So many town halls, water projects, primary health care centres and hospitals, markets, and schools in many communities and churches were initiated and completed by them.
So as they travel home again this month for these conferences popularly known as “August meeting”, there is need to set agenda for them and expect that they prioritize solving the many social challenges facing our communities, the Igbo society and Nigeria as a nation at the moment.
At the family level, women must come up with solutions to the eroding peace and unity in our families. It is no longer news that most of the difficulties facing our families are due to the economic hardship in the country and financial pressures facing families. This is the time for them to bring their A-game in financial management to run their homes. Young mothers must be taught how to prioritize needs in their families and scale down on un-necessities such as costly clothes, shoes and hairs. This is the time for women to learn different skills that will make them self reliant. Church and community groups can make the empowerment of women their major projects this year. While we commend the initiation of physical infrastructural projects, we must also emphasize the importance of human capital development. Humans must be upskilled to manage infrastructure. Any development effort that does not consider the human factor is an effort in futility.
Women with adolescent children must be taught how to be more handy in managing the changing needs of this group. The rate of mental health disorders, depressions and indulgence in different forms of illicit drug use among this age group is worrisome and our women need to be prepared to provide help where they are needed.
Also, the rate of divorce and separation even in Christian families should also be a source of concern. Women, in their meetings, must identify some of the issues that trigger the trend especially among young couples. United families are essential to raising godly children. If we get it right at home, the society will be a better place to live in.
Another issue of concern that must not be left untouched in this year’s August meetings will be the increasing forms of physical, sexual, verbal, emotional, psychological, economic, and domestic violence or abuse against women in our different communities and towns. In the past year, there were many reports on social and mainstream media of violence against women and the girl-child in Anambra state. The incidence of inhumane widowhood practices still persist. It is even more painful when some of these violence were perpetrated by women themselves. Women must, therefore, speak up against these practices. And beyond speaking up, they must take actions to end these practices. They can set up committees in their churches and communities that will enforce the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Law 2017 and insist that town unions also set up similar steering committees and task forces that will review exiting customs and traditional practices that institutionalize violence against persons especially women and the girl child.
This year’s “August meeting” should not be another annual jamboree but a time for critical re-evaluations and providing solutions to the many challenges facing our society. But, even, more than ever, women must use this August meeting to intercede in prayers for their children, husbands, Anambra State and Nigeria at large.
Written by MRS MARTHA IBEZIM
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