Onari Duke, the former first lady of Cross River state, is a legal practitioner, an entrepreneur, a certified mediation/dispute resolution consultant and philanthropist. She is the managing partner of the law firm of Duke&Bobmanuel and serves as the executive Chairman of Allied Merchants & Brokers limited, a merchandising and brokerage firm.

Mrs. Duke also serves as a country Director of Empretec Nigeria foundation, a United Nations centre for trade& development (UNCTAD) private sector support initiative to help Nigerians achieve higher levels of productivity and competitiveness among small and medium- scale enterprise. In this interview with Esther Onyegbula, she talks about what she has been up to since she left the Cross-Rivers state government house.

What have you been doing since you left office?
Nothing different from what I have been doing before my husband got into office. I will say I have not gotten into anything new. I have just continued with what I was doing before my husband was elected. Those are precisely the things I am still doing. When he was in office, I wasn’t running the law firm, but I had started focusing more on my rice business. In a way, that is what I no longer continued. My company represented Uncle Benz rice in the country but I have not continued with the business.

Foundations and pet projects founded by first ladies die immediately they leave office. Why?
I don’t think that is true or that they die a natural death. But it all depends on the reason why they were established in the first place. For me, I didn’t establish foundation or pet project because my husband was in office. I would have done these projects even if he was not in office. The advantage while he was in the office was that it gave me a platform to operate in a more focused area in the state. Prior to that I had been in Lagos and I had two national NGOs that I ran across Nigeria.

I run programs across Nigeria and outside like in Ghana. So as to why programs should end because the founder is no longer in office, I can’t comment because that has not been the case. Perhaps they have had various challenges and issues. It depends on the structure you have in place while the program was on.

Let’s talk about women. Do you think this administration has done much in terms of 30 per cent women’s participation in government through affirmative action?
There have been all sorts of declarations and conventions that have been held and policies are in place that allow women to have opportunity, whether they are working or not, the challenge is still there.

It is probably not working but I will say that we are on course to seeing an improvement today. The two key positions in Nigeria, as far as I am concerned, the ministry of Finance and Petroleum are headed by women. Also, we have several appointments of females into political offices both at federal and state levels: Presently, there are 12 female Ministers in Nigeria. Ogun, Lagos, Ekiti, Akwa-Ibom have female deputy governors. As these women do their work judiciously well, if that happens that will give more women the opportunity and give the men folk the realization that women can do it.

We are having more women on board of corporate companies. We are having women in financial and other corporate institution occupy more senior positions and their men folk now know that these women are good or better than they are.

We have continued to have major challenge with the issue of the girl child as with tradition just as it is with what we have imbibed from colonization that women should be housewives while men went out to fend for the family. But the truth is that in most families, women are the breadwinners.

What is the economic importance of functional education?
Prosperity of any nation is a function of the level of education of its citizens both the male and the female. 48% of economically-active class are females. Their level of education will definitely add to the quality of their production. 22% of household in Nigeria are female headed (there is a possibility of 17% increase in the next five years). Uneducated household heads may be poor and find it possible to send their children to school irrespective of their sex.

37% of SMEs in Nigeria are owned by women and according to the United Nations Industrial Development Organization & other international studies; integration of developing countries into the global economy through economic liberalization, deregulation, and democratization is seen as the paramount way to triumph over poverty and inequality. A key element to this process is the development of an animated private sector, in which the youth and the SMEs play a central role. Simply put, women are key to poverty eradication in Nigeria.

What are your core values as a woman?
I think most importantly is your relationship with God and when you have a relationship with God it means you would love him and when you love him, you will want to please him. When you have that sort of relationship with God, you discover that you begin to reflect on the things that you do.

The bible says love your neighbour as yourself. You are almost more important than your neighbour because God is using you as a parameter, if you don’t love yourself it will be difficult for you to love your neighbour. And when you have a relationship with God you have a rich self esteem you are confident. Self esteem is very key because nobody can place you above where you place yourself

How have you  empowered women ?
I don’t think women are less than men, I don’t also think that we should be pitied. I don’t want to fill a vacant position because they are looking for a woman to fill that position. I want to fill a position that is vacant because I am competent to hold that office and so that is what I try to encourage in women; not to see themselves as a pity party or less privileged people that must be pitied because if you see yourself so you will remain there.

But I will say to give them equal opportunity as the men folk so that women who are competent are able to show themselves and to do whatever assignment whenever the opportunity arises are given the opportunity to do so. But the truth is that wherever you find a woman as the head of a company, institution or organization, she often is most times better than the men.

How did you get into advocacy?
From childhood, I have been a member of Girl’s Guide and Girls Scout which is basically voluntarism; I grew up in an environment that shared love, which is sacrificial giving. And that is what Christianity is all about- giving. How many houses can you have for yourself? Every single additional stuff that you have is for other people.