Northern Women Representation in Federal Cabinet Rises

Taraba, Gombe, Yobe, Kaduna and even Sokoto 😳 have women ministerial nominees in the Federal Cabinet, some for the first time. This is an impressive feat, though feminist groups will wail, as usual, that it is not sufficient. That means hardworking women can be identified, just as men when it comes to competence even in states like Sokoto.

Some may urgue that it has to do with the men behind them and in three of the cases, it can be easily proven by the fact that they came from the same family, like in the case of Yobe, or the same ward as their governors like in the case of Kaduna and Sokoto. Some may even validly go further to argue that their nomination and that of many technocrats in the list carry the political signatures of their governors who likely promoted their nomination.

Though none of the above points can be refuted, the point to emphasize here is that these sisters are really competent. Except on some rare occasions, appointments of this nature, world over, are and should be the result of a balance between professional competence and political value, killing two games with one bullet, so to say. So the nominee may not necessarily be the most competent or even the best professionally from his or her state. But he or she must be both competent and politically most convenient.

This is a sharp difference from the past where governors make the nominations not only of ministers but of nearly all political appointments to the president. In making such nominations, competence was least regarded and, often superseded, by incompetence. The whim of the governors was paramount because the president and the party relied on them to rig elections.

The zoning of corruption, as I call it, was also challenged for the first time. It was not anything about service before but all about the material benefit of the position. This time, with the absence of material benefit, it was possible to overlook zoning in some states in order to emphasise merit. Zoning gives you only a 50% chance of getting the right person, but competence gives you something close to 100% even when political considerations are taken. Change comes by allowing radicals to break practices that have ossified into bad customs. Now, the next President does not have to surrender his powers to the governors or bribe the senate before he can form a cabinet. He will be free to follow the path of competence, once he is sufficiently bold and honest, with minimum interference from political godfathers.

Though I am light years away from feminism, I will be glad to see more women in cabinet positions. In that, they do not need to be equal with men in number, but they must not be less than them in opportunity. This hope cannot be achieved on the altar of suffrage but on the basis of hardwork, which will make them competent and, only then, worthy of political consideration like this one.

As a footnote, though not less relevant, is the appointment of Hadiza Bala Usman as the chief-of-staff in Kaduna. I think it is the first of its kind in our history. She, as a woman chief, will be commanding men. Wr have jad women SSGs before but not Chiefs of Staff. It sends a strong signal that ojr sisters have on their own come of age. We hope she performs just as good as her late father who once occupied the SSG seat.

The women on the ministerial list - and others like Hadiza who are appointed on competence - have treaded that path. They are not like the maggots that sat in the same position to ravage our treasury. No. They are here to competently work for our common good. To them I say, congratulations! They have come a long way.

On Ja66ama!

Dr. Aliyu U. Tilde