A group of Women Leaders representing the All Progressives Congress (APC) from the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) have expressed deep concern over what they perceive as neglect and lack of inclusion within the party’s activities.
President of the forum, Patricia Yakubu, expressed the women’s grievances to the National Chairman of the APC, Dr. Abdullah Ganduje, during a meeting in Abuja on Tuesday.
She stressed the critical need for women leaders to be actively involved in all matters concerning women’s affairs within the states. She cited their close connection to grassroots party women, adding that it was a voting demographic that must not be overlooked.
Yakubu complained that even essential palliatives were not channelled through women leaders for distribution to grassroots communities, a situation that left many disillusioned.
“The states’ women leaders will want to advocate that we should be carried along in all the affairs pertaining to women in the states. We are closer to the party women at the grassroots, the largest voting bloc in the secular world. Our demography should not be neglected.
“Since after the elections, Your Excellency may note that only one bag of rice and one paper wrapper was given to the states women leaders from the national secretariat of the party. Nothing was given to us during Easter, the Ramadan fasting period and Salah festivities.
“Even the palliatives that were distributed were not given to the women leaders for onward distribution to the grassroots. We party women waited and waited and waited to no avail, very sad,” she said.
Reflecting on the sacrifices made during the 2023 elections, Yakubu recounted the challenges the women leaders faced, including personal hardships such as property damage, detainment, and accidents incurred during the election campaigns.
“Another woman was detained in the police station for three days on the election day. Then one of us was involved in a ghastly motor accident during the campaign, because they did not want to hear of APC in her community and is still in and out of the hospital.
“Many of us got their cars damaged and some completely lost their personal cars during the campaigns and today, they are not mobile.”
Despite these sacrifices, the women said they had been sidelined and disconnected from federal government empowerment programmes tailored for women.
The women leaders urged for more involvement of state women leaders in programme planning from inception, to make it easier to address state-specific challenges effectively.
She also called for regular interactions between national and state women leaders to foster a better understanding of grassroots dynamics and to devise targeted solutions.
The women leaders requested Chairman Ganduje’s intervention to integrate women more comprehensively into party programmes, as active inclusion and support would not only empower women leaders but also strengthen the APC, particularly in states where there are no APC governors.
“The national woman leader and her deputy should involve the state women leaders in all their programmes from the designing stage so as to attract our full participation and involvement, by so doing will help capture the peculiarities of the various states.
“We, the women leaders of the 36 states and the FCT, pray the national woman leader and her deputy to periodically interact with women leaders at the state level, so as to have full knowledge of happenings at the grassroots and proffer solutions,” Yakubu said.
The women expressed confidence in the National Chairman Ganduje and the National Working Committee.