Gender Discourse in Nigerian Politics: Understanding the rise and Growth of Women's Participation

Abstract

This article examines the lingering issue of gender inequality in Nigeria, with a special reference to women’s participation in politics. The issue has been  recurrently kicked back and disregarded by the government. Broadly, the Nigerian woman is continually at a lesser par and treated unequally when  compared to her foreign counterparts. Often, culture is usually the justification wielded for the denial of women’s rights and the perpetuation of gender  inequality in Nigerian politics. The latter has been traced to the cultures, traditions, and beliefs, which gave a strong foundation to its perpetuation,  facilitated by some harmful cultural practices including female genital mutilation (FGM), domestic violence, child brides or rape and forced marriages,  among other such cases of abuse against women. The struggle for women’s empowerment is explained using theories deducted from the western world,  whose antecedents differ from that of Africa. In light of the foregoing, the article adopted the historical method of description and analysis to  shed more light on the phenomenon. The article discovered that in Nigeria, the power relations between men and women still undermine women’s role  in politics, and their socioeconomic and diplomatic values due to the cultural consideration of women as only relevant to the social side of life, and the  cultural composition of the society that perpetuates these gender roles. Nonetheless, the role of women in governance has continued to attract the  international feminist audience and has been at the centre of discourse for decades.