Cecelia Bolaji Dada was a former vice-chairman of Apapa Local Government and the current Commissioner for Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation in Lagos State. In this Interview, she speaks on how the Lagos State government has been supporting and empowering rural women and the legacy she wants to leave behind at the expiration of her tenure. SEGUN KASALI brings the excerpts.
Lagos state recently celebrated the International Day of Rural Women. Why did the state decide to do this?
October 16th of every year is the International Day for Rural Women. It is our responsibility to celebrate our women in the rural area. It is for us to let the women in the rural areas know that the government is mindful of them, celebrates them and the government is ready to support them.
How is your government been celebrating and supporting the rural women?
As a ministry, we have had several empowerment programmes for our rural women. We have had farming training programme and so many others for them. So, we have had several empowerment programmes for them.
How many rural women have you empowered so far in 2020
Since the beginning of this year, we have empowered over 17,000 women in Lagos state both at the rural level and the urban level.
What kind of empowerment do they acquire?
We had four weeks short-term skill acquisition empowerment training where we gave them start-up packs for all the different skills that they acquired. We graduated 6,252 students from our skills and acquisition centres. We gave empowerment materials to over a thousand women and we also did farming training for women in the rural area. The students from our skills and acquisition centre and those that we gave four weeks acquisition training, we also give them entrepreneurship training. This is because it is one thing to learn a skill and it is another thing for them to be able to run their business. So, when we train, we also train on entrepreneurship.
What about the role of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)?
Oh! Definitely, one of the goals is to empower women and to alleviate poverty and that is what we stand for as a ministry.
What is the rationale behind the Theme: Rural Women and Girls building climate resilience?
You see for people in the rural areas, they are the ones that cook with firewood. They are the ones that set normal fish. They are the ones selling roasted corn. They are the ones that sell roasted plantain. They are the ones that are more affected by the climate change. So, we need to educate them on the things that they need to know. For instance, you need to let them know that when you roast a corn, you are not better than someone who had smoked a packet of cigarettes. So, we need to sensitise our women in the rural areas for them to know the effect of global warming and climate change as it affects them in the rural area.
What is your perception towards gender balance?
Well, Lagos state government has been gender-sensitive and that is why for example you have 12 women in the Lagos State Executive Council. Having said that, I believe we can still get more as women. So, for us as a ministry, we are set for more women to be empowered, more women to be in governance and for more women to increase the economy of our country.
What would you love to be remembered for?
Women empowerment. I want to be remembered for empowering women.
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