By JOSEPHINE IGBINOVIA

Barr.(Mrs.)Olufunmi Oluyede is the current Chairperson of the International Federation of Women Lawyers, FIDA, Lagos State Chapter. FIDA, an organization in the vanguard of protecting women and children’s rights, has over the years defended the rights of abused women and children worldwide through its various chapters. Here, Barr.Olufunmi speaks on  how FIDA Lagos has  continued to keep the ideals of  the association. Hear her:

Foremost on our agenda in this tenure is the establishment of an ultra-modern FIDA Community Resource Center –primarily for the enhancement and protection of the rights and interests of women, children and the underprivileged in the Lagos environs.

This center will be fully equipped with a full-fledged library with books, journals, audio-visuals, tapes, computers and other beneficial educational infrastructures; halls and meeting rooms for consultations, training workshops/seminars, conferences, etc.; dedicated telephone help-lines for legal aid; a functional business center, a modern-day crèche with children’s play area et al. A well-articulated plan for the project (with architectural drawings, etc.) is currently awaiting requisite approval by FIDA Nigeria which is our parent body.

Barely six months in office, the current executive of FIDA Lagos has engaged in a number of notable, innovative projects and activities. However, one major hurdle for us has been that of funding. But for a dearth of funds, we would be operating at a much higher plane than we are currently. We would be touching more lives and our impact would be better felt by many more of our targeted categories of citizens.

Barr.Olufunmi Oluyede

FIDA has recorded phenomenal successes in the fight against dehumanizing widowhood practices such as dispossessing widows of their late husbands’ properties. Our efforts in this regard have always yielded positive and encouraging consequences.

The average FIDAN is professionally trained and fully equipped, by virtue of that training, to effectively deal with matters such as these in and out of court through such alternative dispute resolution mechanisms as negotiation, conciliation, mediation –and recourse to good old litigation where absolutely indispensable.

When a widow is dispossessed of her husband’s properties, her children automatically begin to suffer. In some cases, the children are forced to drop out of school because of lack of resources. In accordance with Section 42(2) of the Nigerian Constitution, the Child’s Rights Act and similar other legislations, no Nigerian child is to be subjected to discrimination by virtue of the circumstances of his/her birth.

Whether a child is the product of a marriage under the Act or otherwise, he or she has rights and interests in law which FIDANs routinely and effectively help to enforce and protect to their advantage through the courts. Therefore, we stop at nothing to help these women and children gain all that are rightfully theirs.

The family unit is the bedrock of society. It is the foundation on which the society is built. The woman of the family is its heart; its mainstay focal point. Ultimately, the strength of the society will depend on the general well-being of the woman. If there’s injustice, squandering of the nation’s wherewithal and general deficiency and impoverishment in consequence thereof, it first manifests in the difficulty and hardship faced by the woman daily in her bid to preserve and ensure the survival of her family.

That was why we all saw women taking to the streets in protest against the federal government total removal of subsidy recently. Naturally, a woman who normally feeds her family on a weekly budget of N5,000 and then wakes up one day to discover that that she has to cough out more than triple the regular price, for her cooking kerosene and her general budget have more than quadrupled, will surely take to the streets out of frustration and fury at the warped system that has plunged her further into dire straits and wanton destitution. It’s an instinctive, natural human reaction –the expected consequence of mal-governance.

I’m not saying that I’m against the removal of subsidy. The simple truth is that I’ll be at peace when the average Nigerian can feed on three square meals a day with no reservations, when our children are educated and thrive in an environment that guarantees a better life at graduation; when that fuel subsidy removal translates into better infrastructure, functional hospitals, and enhanced social services in its entire ramification.

In our wide-ranging quest to reform and positively impact the society, the socio-economic and political well-being of women and their children accordingly remain the paramount mission of FIDA.

By its very being, FIDA as instituted is to preserve and uphold the rights and interests of women of today and of the future. With the latter, in our periodic outreaches, we inter alia and organize mentoring and capacity building programmes/events centered on various pertinent themes.

For instance, our 2012 FIDA Law Week annual event will have as theme ‘Human Trafficking: Prevention, intervention & Prosecution’ with special focus on labour trafficking(from the village to the city and sex trafficking from home to the brothel). One of our specialized workshops will be an interactive session devoted to the restoration and re-orientation of young girls (students, street kids, etc.) who become victims of sex and labour trafficking.’