The Better Life for rural women Programme, established in of planners and world development bodies is far from whether 1987 by the then first lady Hajia Maryam Babangida was an or not some quantum of success is recorded, rather, the interest offshoot of Beijing Conference of 1985.
- Better Life For Rural Women Program In Nigeria 2016
- Rural Women Development
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- The newly resuscitated Better Life Programme for African Rural Women, in partnership with Nigeria Infrastructure Advisory Facility, has initiated a programme geared towards providing access to.
- Better Life for Rural Women. The spiritual head of One Love Family, while revealing his vision for the general elections, message for Nigeria, Africa and its leaders in 2019, insisted that.
The Better Life Programme for Rural Women or BLP was a project in Nigeria started in September 1987 by Maryam Babangida, the wife of President Ibrahim Babangida. The programme was discontinued after a change in government. The idea of BLP originated at a workshop organized by Maryam Babangida with the scope of discussing relegation of rural women in discourse affecting national development and invisibility of positive actions towards causes favoring rural women. When the project started, the objectives were to reduce maternal and child mortality rate by increasing basic healthcare facilities for women, provide income generating opportunities in agriculture and cottage industries, integrate rural women into national development plans and develop educational training for women.
However, the programme provoked criticism because funds allocated to many projects were unaccounted for largely because there was no budgetary allocation to fund BLP. Access to government funds by a first lady was challenged as unconstitutional and some critics view the project as a means to increase the personality of the first lady.[1]
- 1The Programme
- 1.1Projects
The Programme[edit]
Prior to the launch of Better Life, Maryam Babangida held consultations with various stakeholders such as the Directorate for Food and Rural Infrasturcture and women organizations about economic and social constraints affecting rural women. In 1986, she visited two villages close to Lagos, Igbologun and Ilado-Odo.[2] The villages did not have clean water and power distribution infrastructure. The visit confirmed her understanding that more actions should be directed towards rural development. In 1987, a workshop on the role of rural women in development was held in Abuja and led to the establishment of BLP.
Projects[edit]
BLP focused on key areas of nutrition, education, agriculture.
Agriculture[edit]
BLP created strategies that mobilized some rural women farmers to produce affordable food crops that has nutritional and national development values such as Cassava for starch production and grain produce. Women farmers were encouraged to unite under cooperative societies to increase access to credit and land grants, extension services and technology.[3]
The programme introduced basic farm and mechanized inputs such as cutlasses and subsidized tractor for hire service. Food processing machines were also made available to women farmers.
Education[edit]
A strategy to increase literacy and the agriculture know how of rural women was adult literacy programmes tailored to functional and vocational subject areas such as dress making, knitting and mathematics.[3]
Healthcare[edit]
BLP mobilized the provision of primary health care centers close to rural settlements. It mobilized women to get immunizations, established small pharmacies and trained mid-wives and provided VVF centers. The programme was also involved in extending family planning services to rural women and providing education about health and safety issues concerning child marriage and sexually transmitted diseases.[3]
Organizational structure[edit]
After the launch of BLP, wives of military governors were tasked to understand the plight of rural women in their specific states and create projects that will benefit rural women and linking such projects to the appropriate state ministry. A committee under the headship of the wife of the military governor, that included a director general and leading female government employees managed and implemented BLP projects in each state.
From 1987 to 1993. BLP did not legally have access to any budgetary allocation and critics soon queried the source of funding for many of its projects. Many wives of governor advertised their projects in newspapers and when attending conferences stayed at choice hotels. Many of these actions provoked a debate about the constitutional authority of a wive of a military president and access to state funds.[1]
References[edit]
- ^ abMama, Amina (1995). 'Feminism or Femocracy? State Feminism and Democratisation in Nigeria'. Africa Development / Afrique et Développement. 20 (1): 37–58. JSTOR43657968.
- ^Komolafe, Funmi; Kumolu, Charles (28 December 2009). 'She made the difference - Vanguard News'. Vanguard News.
- ^ abcGabriel, Amakievi. 'A Better Life Program for Rural Women in a Developing Nation'(PDF).
| First Lady of Nigeria | |
|---|---|
| In role 17 August 1985[1] – 27 August 1993.[1] | |
| President | Ibrahim Babangida |
| Preceded by | Safinatu Buhari |
| Succeeded by | Margaret Shonekan |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Maryam Okogwu 1 November 1948 Asaba, Delta State, Nigeria |
| Died | 27 December 2009 (aged 61) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Nationality | Nigerian |
| Spouse(s) | Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (m. 6 September 1969 – 27 December 2009; her death) |
| Children | Mohammed, Aminu, Aisha, Halima |
| Alma mater | La Salle Extension University (Chicago, Illinois, U.S.) (Diploma) NCR Institute in Lagos(Certificate in Computer Science) |
| Profession | Activist |
Maryam Babangida (1 November 1948 – 27 December 2009) was the wife of General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, who was Nigeria's head of state from 1985 to 1993.[1] Her husband was the target of criticism for rampant corruption during his regime.[2] She was credited with creating the position of First Lady of Nigeria and making it her own.[1]
As first lady, she launched many programmes to improve the life of women. The 'Maryam Phenomenon' became a celebrity and 'an icon of beauty, fashion and style', a position she retained after her husband's fall from power.[1][3]
Early years[edit]
Maryam King was born in 1948 in Asaba (present-day Delta State), where she attended her primary education. Her parents were Hajiya Asabe Halima Mohammed from the present Niger State, a Hausa, and Leonard Nwanonye Okogwu from Asaba, an Igbo. She later moved north to Kaduna where she attended Queen Amina's College Kaduna for her Secondary education. She graduated as a secretary at the Federal Training Centre, Kaduna. Later she obtained a diploma in secretaryship[clarification needed] from La Salle Extension University (Chicago, Illinois) and a Certificate in Computer Science from the NCR Institute in Lagos.[3][4]
On 6 September 1969, shortly before her 21st birthday, she married Major Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida. They had four children, boys Mohammed and Aminu, and two girls, Aisha and Halima.[5] After her husband became Chief of Army Staff in 1983, Maryam Babangida became President of the Nigerian Army Officers Wives Association (NAOWA). She was active in this role, launching schools, clinics, women's training centres and child day care centers.[3]
Her hobbies were gardening, interior decoration, music, squash, badminton, collecting birds, philanthropic activities and reading.
First lady[edit]
When her husband became head of state in 1985, Maryam Babangida moved with her children into Dodan Barracks in Lagos. She had to arrange for considerable renovations to make the rooms more suitable for formal receptions. Dodan barracks was one of the key locations seized in the April 1990 coup attempt by Gideon Orkar against Ibrahim Babangida, who was present in the barracks when the attack occurred, but managed to escape via a back route.[6]
As First Lady of Nigeria between 1985 and 1993, she turned the ceremonial post into a champion for women's rural development. She founded the Better Life Programme for Rural Women in 1987 which launched many co-operatives, cottage industries, farms and gardens, shops and markets, women’s centres and social welfare programs.[7]The Maryam Babangida National Centre for Women's Development was established in 1993 for research, training, and to mobilize women towards self-emancipation.[8]
Better Life For Rural Women Program In Nigeria 2016
She championed women issues vigorously.[9]She reached out to the first ladies of other African countries to emphasize the effective role they can play in improving the lives of their people.[10]
Her book, Home Front: Nigerian Army Officers and Their Wives, published in 1988, emphasized the value of the work that women perform in the home in support of their husbands, and has been criticized by feminists.[11]
Working with the National Council for Women's Societies (NCWS) she had significant influence, helping gain support for programmes such as the unpopular SFEM (Special Foreign Exchange Market)[12] program to cut subsidies, and to devalue and fix the currency. She also established a glamorous persona. Talking about the opening of the seven-day Better Life Fair in 1990, one journalist said 'She was like a Roman empress on a throne, regal and resplendent in a stone-studded flowing outfit that defied description...' Women responded to her as a role model, and her appeal lasted long after her husband fell from power.[13]
Illness and death[edit]
On November 15, 2009, rumours circulated that the former first lady had died in her hospital bed at the University of California (UCLA) Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center in Los Angeles over complications arising from terminal ovarian cancer.[14] However, an aide to the former president, said 'Mrs Maryam Babangida is alive ... I told her about the spreading rumour in Nigeria concerning her death and she laughed, saying those carrying the rumour would die before her.'[15]
Maryam died aged 61 from ovarian cancer on 27 December 2009 in a Los Angeles, California hospital.[14][16] Her husband was at her side as she died.[5]President of the Senate of Nigeria, David Mark, was said to have broken down into tears upon hearing the news.[17]
Rural Women Development
The Times of Nigeria reported on her death that she was 'considered to be one of the greatest women in Africa today'.[5]
Bibliography[edit]
- Maryam Babangida (1988). The home front: Nigerian army officers and their wives. Fountain Publications. ISBN978-2679-48-8.
References[edit]
- ^ abcdeAdemola Babalola (December 28, 2009). 'Maryam's life and times of beauty, glamour and…cancer'. The Punch. Archived from the original on December 29, 2009. Retrieved December 28, 2009.
- ^'Shamed By Their Nation', Time Magazine, 6 September 1993
- ^ abc'Maryam Babangida'. Pre-Adult Affairs Organisation. Archived from the original on November 19, 2009. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^Ikeddy Isiguzo (December 28, 2009). 'Adieu, Country's First Lady'. Retrieved April 18, 2010.
- ^ abc'Maryam's Death: General Babangida's Statement'. The Times of Nigeria. December 27, 2009. Retrieved December 28, 2009.
- ^'Orkar coup: How we survived'. Sun News. November 1, 2009. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^'Maryam Babangida, Charming, Still...' Nigeria Films. December 25, 2008. Archived from the original on November 19, 2009. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^'Maryam Babangida National Centre for Women Development'. Natural Capital Institute. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^'Anxiety over Maryam Babangida's health'. Nigerian Compass. November 16, 2009. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^'Highlights of the 1991 Africa Prize: Mrs. Maryam Ibrahim Babangida'. The Hunger Project. Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^Chikwenye Okonjo Ogunyemi (1996). Africa wo/man palava: the Nigerian novel by women - Women in culture and society. University of Chicago Press. p. 56ff. ISBN0-226-62085-9.
- ^'Nigeria - Structural Adjustment'. Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress. Retrieved December 28, 2009.
- ^David J. Parkin; Lionel Caplan; Humphrey J. Fisher (1996). The politics of cultural performance. Berghahn Books. p. 45ff. ISBN1-57181-925-8.
- ^ abZhang Xiang (December 28, 2009). 'Former Nigerian first lady dies in U.S.'Xinhua News Agency. Retrieved December 28, 2009.
- ^Iyobosa Uwugiaren (November 16, 2009). 'I'm Alive - Maryam Babangida'. Leadership (Abuja). Retrieved November 22, 2009.
- ^Semiu Okanlawon, Olusola Fabiyi & Francis Falola (December 28, 2009). 'Maryam Babangida dies at 61'. The Punch. Archived from the original on December 29, 2009. Retrieved December 28, 2009.
- ^Martins Oloja, Azimazi Momoh, (Abuja), Alemma-Ozioruwa Aliu, Benin City and John Ojigi, Minna (December 28, 2009). 'Tears for Maryam Babangida'. NGR Guardian News. Archived from the original on December 28, 2009. Retrieved December 28, 2009.CS1 maint: Multiple names: authors list (link)