At different points in Nigeria’s rich history, women have taken so many important positions in yearning for change.
It should come as no surprise that Nigerian women are sometimes on the front lines of political change. In many ways, history has always repeated itself.
Nigerian women have a long history of mobilising for protests and demonstrations, they have been frontliners, driving change where needed.
Sometimes, Nigerian women have historically employed ‘naked protests’ to seek change.
On July 23, 2020, hundreds of women – mostly naked – staged a protest in the northwestern state of Kaduna, Nigeria. They protested at the killing of people in their community.
From the Women’s conflict protest of the 1910s to the Calabar Women Protest of 1924, the Aba Women’s Riot of 1929, the Abeokuta Women’s Revolt of the Nineteen Forties, the “Bring Back our Girls” motion of 2014, and the March towards Rape of June 2020, #EndSARS movement, in lots of approaches, ladies have determined the form of how Nigerians protest.
In birthday party of International Women’s Day 2021 themed as ‘Choose to Challenge’, right here are seven moments in the records of Nigeria wherein Nigerian women have been on the front-line.
1. Women’s conflict protest of the 1910s
In the 1910s, women in Agbaja stayed away from their homes for a month in protest because of suspicions amongst them that some men had been secretly killing pregnant ladies.
Their collective absence driven village elders to do so to cope with their worries.
2. Aba Women’s Riots of 1929
This was a length of unrest in colonial Nigeria.
The “riots” or the conflict turned into led by using women inside the provinces of Calabar and Owerri in southeastern Nigeria in November and December of 1929.
The protests broke out while lots of Igbo women from the Bende District, Umuahia and other places in japanese Nigeria traveled to the town of Oloko to protest in opposition to the Warrant Chiefs, whom they accused of restricting the function of women in the government.
The Aba Women’s Riots of 1929, because it was named in British statistics, is greater aptly taken into consideration a strategically carried out rebel organised by way of girls to redress social, political and monetary grievances.
The protest encompassed women from six ethnic companies – Ibibio, Andoni, Orgoni, Bonny, Opobo, and Igbo.
It was stated that the conflict resulted in the loss of life of 51 ladies.
3. Calabar women protest of 1924
three,000 girls in Calabar went out to protest a marketplace toll that was required by the government.
When the Colonial officials announced the toll, the girls omitted it and went approximately their regular market activities but unfortunately they have been driven away by way of colonial police. This however led to a large revolt by way of the ladies
Back then, the presence of girls institutions and marketplace ladies networks helped the protest movement.
4. Abeokuta girls’s rise up of the Forties
These girls spent numerous years protesting the tax increase and the lack of ladies illustration in authorities.
They believed that until they were granted representation in local authorities, they shouldn’t pay taxes otherwise from men.
This rebellion brought about the introduction of Abeokuta Women’s Union (AWU) under the leadership of Fumilayo Ransome-Kuti.
This political organisaton, united market girls and middle-elegance women and additionally challenged the colonial rule and patriarchal structure.
5. Bring Back Our Girls motion of 2014
After over two hundred girls were abducted from the school in Borno by Boko Haram insurgents, all eyes have been on the Nigerian government to behave rapidly.
When the response of the government became now not yielding fine effects, girls mobilised in Kaduna, Abuja, Lagos and throughout the u . S . To protest for the rescue of those girls.
The #BringBackOurGIrls and #SaveOurGirls went viral and piqued the interest of the worldwide network.
Women from all around the global joined the protest and over 1,000,000 people signed the petition to mobilise global leaders to assist rescue the ladies.
6. Protest against rape and sexual violence in June 2020
In June 2020, Nigerian ladies took to the streets after a sequence of high-profile rape instances caught the hobby of the people.
Following the tale of 22-year-old Uwa Vera who become raped and murdered in a Church, more tales of ladies getting raped and killed surfaced on-line and this led to a protest organised via ladies.
Women mobilised and held a protest in Abuja and Lagos.
The hashtag #NOmeansNo trended on-line as greater victims of rape shared their story. There became a movement to prevent sufferer-blaming and to discourage people from allowing rape with their silence.
7. #EndSARS movement – Feminist Coalition
At the leading edge of the progressive kids-led movement in opposition to police brutality in Nigeria is the Feminist Coalition – a group of young Nigerian feminists collectively mobilizing all sides of the worldwide #EndSARS protests.
During the protests the non-governmental organisation raised $385,000 (£290,000) via crowdfunding and spent part of the cash on legal services for those protesters who were arrested, to pay clinical bills for the ones wounded, to provide non-public security at protest factors and each day refreshments.
The coalition is the brainchild of Dami Odufuwa and Odun Eweniyi.
Formed in July, the #EndSars protest changed into the employer’s first essential undertaking.
Although ladies’s safety and monetary equality are on the core of the agency’s goals, equality for each person is their imaginative and prescient, and so they decided to combat the injustice perpetuated by way of the squad with the aid of becoming a member of within the protests.
These women, named and unnamed, are the backbone of a series of resistance. By marching, volunteering, mobilizing, tweeting, speakme, donating, and flagrantly trampling on sexist, they may be, surely, the amplifiers of this historic Nigerian revolution.
No comments:
Post a Comment