Today’s episode is a continuation of our recent series focused on the women’s movement and contemporary feminist politics in Nigeria. If you’re interested in these themes, be sure to check out the past two episodes, where we explore these questions from a number of different angles. Today, we’re taking a deeper dive into the complex history, the present character, and the future trajectory of Nigerian feminism. We’re very glad to be joined by a much-respected and admired feminist and trade unionist, who will share insights on the struggles and triumphs of women in Nigeria—from their historical roots to today’s fight against blatant misogyny and political marginalization.

Our interviewee is none other than comrade Hauwa Mustapha, a development economist, social activist, researcher, and policy analyst with the Nigerian Labour Congress, one of Nigeria’s central trade union federations. She was also one of the key figures in the generation of student activists that instigated nothing short of a nationwide revolt against structural adjustment in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Comrade Hauwa, we are very glad you could join us today. Thank you for making the time.

You’re welcome. I’m happy to be here too.

We’ve really been looking forward to talking to you, so it’s great to have you. To start us off—can you tell us a bit about the history of the women’s movement in Nigeria, especially during the military era? Our understanding is that alongside students and trade unions, women’s and feminist movements played a central role in resisting structural adjustment programs, and even in laying the groundwork for the eventual fall of military rule. From your perspective, how did women come to occupy such a central place in Nigeria’s radical struggle?

Well, to talk about the history of women’s struggle in Nigeria, we actually have to go back even before the military era—to the colonial and pre-independence periods. There were powerful, inspiring examples of women’s political participation in those times, despite the prevailing social and cultural norms that restricted women’s roles. These early struggles gave women courage, visibility, and a sense of purpose in contributing to national development—whether in politics, the economy, or other domains. And crucially, these stories were taught in schools not just as history but as sources of inspiration. When we talk about events like the Aba Women’s Riots, or the roles played by women like Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, Hajia Gambo Sawaba, and Margaret Ekpo, we’re referring to a legacy of resistance that shaped generations of Nigerian women, even if these figures are too often forgotten today.

That legacy carried into the post-independence period, when Nigeria experienced successive military regimes that were deeply dictatorial, autocratic, and exploitative. Women during this period faced what we often call double oppression—not only as members of a gender already constrained by patriarchy and tradition but also as members of a subordinate class under a regime that entrenched inequality along class lines. The military was not just repressive; it was also a political elite that actively excluded women from power and visibility. Even within the military institution itself, there was virtually no room for women. And because this system was male-dominated and patriarchal to its core, the few policies or infrastructure initiatives it implemented were designed with men in mind.

So women were silenced—not only in their homes but in public life too. And though even most men did not benefit from the military regime, the few who did were still accommodated in ways that women simply weren’t. Under these conditions, there was widespread agitation. The spirit of activism that had animated earlier generations was still alive, bolstered by global currents like the Cold War and the ideological competition between socialist and capitalist blocs. And so, women began organizing—not just against the military regime, but also against the patriarchy embedded within that system.

One important milestone was the founding of Women in Nigeria (WIN) in 1982. WIN emerged during a period when civic space was shrinking, and women’s voices were increasingly suppressed. It was formed explicitly as a feminist organization, aimed at challenging laws, policies, and social practices that subjected women to both gendered and class-based oppression. Its mission was to confront not just the dictatorship, but also the deeper, structural forces of patriarchy that long predated the military era and would outlast it.

That said, WIN wasn’t alone. Another organization—the National Council for Women’s Societies (NCWS), which still exists today—also emerged around this time. Unlike WIN, however, the NCWS was less ideologically grounded and, in some ways, functioned as a state-aligned body. While not a direct rival, it was often used to counter or dilute the feminist politics advanced by WIN.

At one point, the National Council for Women’s Societies even attempted to bring WIN under its wing, to domesticate it in a sense. But WIN was too strong and too ideologically clear for that. It was an explicitly feminist and socialist organization—not just a women-only platform, though it was women-led. WIN’s analysis was rooted in the understanding that gender oppression could not be separated from class oppression. It argued that patriarchy is not just about men dominating women; it’s about the structural relations between people, between genders, shaped by both culture and capitalism. So WIN welcomed male members, but with a clear organizational principle: Leadership would remain in the hands of women. You would never find a man serving as president or general secretary, or occupying any of the top leadership positions. Men could take on supportive roles—assistant secretary, PR officer, that sort of thing—but the movement made a deliberate, strategic choice to center women’s leadership.

WIN was never a mass organization in the populist sense. Its membership was drawn deliberately from a certain political milieu—it was unapologetically feminist and socialist, and this ideological clarity attracted a particular kind of member. At the time, the student union movement was also very active and radical, strongly influenced by global socialist currents and inspired by the anticolonial legacy of the previous generation. That energy, along with a vibrant press and a still-politicized academic class, created the conditions for WIN to emerge as a significant force. So you had a coalition—students, academics, activists, labor unionists—all coming together through WIN to form a serious and committed feminist movement.

The movement played a key role in challenging the military regime. Even in the broader struggle that culminated in the June 12 protests, WIN was not a peripheral player. It had strong ties to the labor movement, which was also very militant and politically engaged at the time. WIN’s strength came from these alliances, but also from its willingness to name and fight patriarchy—not just as a cultural problem, but as an institutional structure deeply embedded in the state.

There were also external events that added fuel to this fire. The global anti-apartheid movement, solidarity with the Cuban people, and especially the 1995 Beijing Women’s Conference all had a powerful impact on consciousness and organizing. That conference, in particular, helped bring international attention to women’s issues and created a ripple effect that empowered local feminist movements, including WIN. But the gains from Beijing didn’t just materialize on their own. We didn’t attend the conference and come back to instant change. Any benefits we reaped were the result of struggle—of local organizing, agitation, and political pressure from the women’s movement that forced these issues onto the national agenda.

So when we talk about the gains of the women’s movement during the military era—roughly from the 1970s to the early 1990s—we’re really talking about a convergence of factors. There were difficult social conditions, but also a potent ideological current, both locally and globally, including the spirit of Pan-Africanism. Together, these forces gave rise to a formidable movement. And while the movement’s achievements didn’t amount to a complete transformation, they mattered. The push to remove the military from power, the insistence that women’s rights were development issues, the shift in how people thought about policy—all of that was shaped by feminist agitation.

Even if we haven’t reached full equality, the awareness raised in that period was crucial. It forced a recognition—however partial—that development isn’t just about GDP growth or employment statistics. It’s about how these gains are distributed, how they impact women versus men, and whether they reinforce or challenge existing inequalities. In that sense, the movement helped reshape how development and human rights were defined. It made clear that human rights aren’t truly human if they exclude women. And development isn’t meaningful if it ignores gender. The demand to mainstream gender into development policy and law—into every aspect of governance—can be traced directly to the organizing and ideological clarity of the women’s movement during the military era. Because ultimately, that movement wasn’t just fighting military dictatorship; it was fighting for democracy in the fullest sense of the word.

That’s a really insightful background, and there’s a lot in there that I hadn’t encountered before—or, in some cases, had encountered but never quite understood in the same way. Your emphasis on Women in Nigeria as one of the central mass-based feminist organizations is especially striking. It really clarifies the way in which the women’s movement framed the experience of double oppression, and how it shaped the broader development discourse through the 1980s and 1990s.

So I want to ask you about the next period: the return to electoral democracy in the 2000s. In the 1990s, we witnessed the shift away from military rule and the beginning of civilian governance. But this shift didn’t appear to fundamentally disrupt the patriarchal structure of Nigerian politics. The ruling class remained, and remains, overwhelmingly male. The policy apparatus also seems to still serve the interests of this patriarchal elite, even under civilian rule. So my first question is: Why do you think patriarchy has remained so deeply entrenched in this so-called democratic period?

And then, if I may add a second question to that: How would you describe the organizational character of women’s movements in this new era? Because what you’ve described so far is a period of mass-based organizing—movements rooted in coalitions of students, academics, trade unionists. But nowadays, when we think of women’s organizations, we often think in terms of NGOs, not membership-based social movements. So do you think that’s a fair characterization? And if so, how did we arrive at this shift under conditions of nominal democracy?

I think the challenges facing the women’s movement today cannot be separated from the broader transformations that have affected popular organizing—globally, but especially here in Nigeria. What we’re facing is not a superficial shift; it’s a deep and systemic one. And to understand how we arrived here, we need to revisit what happened in the transition from post-independence to military rule, and then into the neoliberal era that followed.

During the military regimes, a lot of the momentum we had been building toward participatory development and active citizenship was abruptly halted. The space for collective political action was violently constricted. And at the same time, on the global stage, the collapse of the socialist bloc—what we might shorthand as the period of glasnost and perestroika—seriously undermined the ideological confidence of progressive movements across the world. In Nigeria, this was compounded by the aggressive, almost violent, imposition of neoliberal economic policies. These policies didn’t just restructure the economy; they restructured political subjectivity. The struggle shifted from being a collective one—for democratic transformation, for social justice—to a fragmented, individualized struggle for personal survival.

This shift had a profound impact on the women’s movement, just as it did on other progressive formations. Neoliberalism thrives on fragmentation. It breaks people up. It attacks institutions and associations that foster solidarity. So we saw the systematic dismantling of the very networks that had anchored radical organizing. Student unions were targeted—through arrests, intimidation, fee hikes, and the removal of subsidies. Families were plunged into economic crisis, as breadwinners lost their jobs and household pressures mounted. That kind of precarity makes it hard to sustain collective action.

And it didn’t stop there. The academy—once a vibrant space for radical thought—was also attacked. So was the press. Even institutions like the Nigerian Bar Association, which had aligned with the women’s movement at various points, faced repression. This wasn’t just ideological pushback; it was a combination of political suppression, economic punishment, and institutional decay. Groups that once served as pillars of movement-building were hollowed out, banned, or forced into retreat.

So what happened was this: Organizations became disorganized, individuals started scrambling for survival, and the wider movement began to dissolve. WIN was weakened. The student movement was weakened. And into this vacuum came a wave of donor funding—funds that claimed to address poverty, youth empowerment, women’s liberation, and so on. But these funds didn’t aim to support movements. In fact, many donors made it clear they would not fund political organizations or groups that appeared too radical. They were only interested in issue-based interventions—youth development here, women’s education there. Crucially, they demanded that people organize around themes to access resources, not around a shared political project.

This ushered in a new kind of segmentation. The jobs crisis meant that there were fewer stable employment opportunities. And suddenly, donor money appeared to offer an alternative, but only if you reshaped yourself to fit their model. Many of the organizations that emerged during this time were born out of the old movement—especially WIN. I would estimate that nearly 80 percent of the prominent women’s organizations in Nigeria today are offshoots of WIN. Their leaders were WIN members, and many of the projects they now run are adapted versions of initiatives that WIN once spearheaded.

So it’s a story of fragmentation.

Exactly—a segmentation of purpose, of focus, of solidarity. Everyone started looking for a piece of the pie, and that pie came in the form of project funding. That’s when you started seeing all these specialized organizations—Girls Empowerment Initiative, Women’s Rights Advancement platforms, various advocacy groups. The people behind them were veterans of the movement. But now, rather than being united under one mass-based, ideologically coherent banner, they were separated into thematically siloed organizations competing for grants.

Still, the spirit of organizing didn’t completely disappear. The conditions that originally gave rise to the movement only deepened. So even within these splintered, donor-driven groups, people still saw the need to confront patriarchy, to challenge laws and customs that continued to marginalize women. But the structure of organizing had changed. In the 1980s and 1990s, movements were built on people—on real membership. People connected around shared political beliefs and organized together, regardless of their individual affiliations. Today, what we have are organizational-based movements. You might hear someone say their network has 200 members, but these are not individuals—they’re organizations. And those organizations don’t necessarily have a mass base or a clearly defined constituency. There’s no organic accountability to a broader collective.

This shift has also changed the nature of the demands being made. The new mode of engagement is largely about policy reform: passing laws on child marriage, trafficking, education, domestic violence, and so forth. Important work, certainly—but reformist in character. In contrast to the revolutionary spirit of the 1980s, what dominates today is a politics of reform. The language has changed too. Terms like “participation” are used, but they often refer to token inclusion—add women and stir—rather than transformation. Concepts like “diversity,” “intersectionality,” and “gender mainstreaming” are invoked, but often in ways that are more cosmetic than structural. They reflect the language of global neoliberalism more than a commitment to systemic change.

We are now dealing with a liberal feminist movement, shaped by donor priorities and global development frameworks. The feminist politics that dominate today are liberal in ideology. Socialist feminism—the foundation that WIN and others once stood on—has been diluted, if not erased. We are no longer talking about a feminism that interrogates the system that creates inequality. We are talking about a feminism that seeks to soften that system’s edges, without challenging its foundations.

So what we have now is a reformist movement, not a revolutionary one. This is a movement that wants to tweak policies—change the language or improve the mechanisms—rather than question the legitimacy of those policies or the power structures that produced them in the first place. Instead of pushing to dismantle and transform systems, we’re seeing efforts to repackage them. Rather than demanding policies that are people-designed, people-oriented, and people-implemented, today’s movement is often content with participating in pre-existing frameworks. It is not seeking to rewrite the script; it is asking for a role in the production.

Another defining feature of this moment is its elitism. The current configuration of gender activism and feminism is largely concentrated in elite spaces—driven by organizational development and professionalized leadership. In many cases, feminism has become a career path. What we’re seeing is a kind of “career feminism” or “career-based gender activism.” The struggle is no longer grounded in the social conditions that first animated feminist politics. Instead, it’s about institutional advancement, visibility, and access to donor resources. The mission is not to overturn inequality or dismantle class power. It’s not about taking power from the ruling elite and transferring it to the oppressed. Rather, the emphasis is on negotiating a seat at the table—on shifting power, not transforming it.

But shifting power and transforming power are not the same thing. The former involves redistributing access within the same unjust system, while the latter challenges the system itself. What’s missing today is a serious interrogation of class. Feminist activism has become more about policy reform—on child marriage, education, legal rights—without grounding those reforms in a deeper structural critique. This is the face of the women’s movement today: elite, reformist, and largely shaped by a liberal, neoliberal agenda. It doesn’t confront neoliberalism; it engages with it. It asks how to make it more inclusive, more “gender-sensitive,” rather than questioning its fundamental logic.

This is a far cry from the kind of movement we built in the past. I remember that we in WIN would often reject invitations to collaborate with state-aligned women’s bodies like the National Council for Women’s Societies. We understood them as appendages of the state, not allies. And it wasn’t about hostility to individuals in government—it was about understanding the government as a structure, as a system. We saw it as a system that required confrontation, not cooperation. We didn’t want to sit at the table. We wanted to flip the table over.

Today’s women’s movement is different. It’s more about negotiating space within the system—getting a seat, being consulted, adding a gender perspective to existing policies. And many of us have become absorbed into this liberal-reformist logic. We’re fighting for rights, yes, but often without interrogating the conditions that robbed us of those rights in the first place. We fight for palliatives, for social protection programs—but we don’t ask why we are impoverished to begin with. We’ve stopped demanding justice, and settled instead for mitigation.

Thank you very much, comrade. I’m sure you could go on and on, and it’s been incredibly insightful hearing your reflections, especially in response to Sa’eed’s earlier questions. One thing that stood out to me was your mention of the Girls’ Power Initiative—particularly as part of your broader narrative of how feminist organizing in Nigeria has evolved. You framed it, along with other initiatives, as markers of different waves of feminist organizing that are often tied to specific historical periods. Personally, I’m familiar with some of these initiatives, though I only recently encountered the Girls’ Power Initiative myself, actually through the coverage of the passing and burial of one of its leading figures.

What struck me is how deeply embedded this initiative seems to be in the social fabric—particularly in Calabar, if not the entire Cross River State. I’d like to pose a question that follows from what you’ve been saying. How do you juxtapose the fragmentation of movements you described earlier with what I think is a more recent phenomenon: the rise of digital feminism, especially online organizing around gender-based violence, misogyny, and related issues? We saw one expression of this during the #EndSARS protests, where the Feminist Coalition played a prominent role. So I suppose my question is: How do you interpret these new expressions of feminism that exist at the intersection of digital and real-world activism? And how do you situate groups like the Feminist Coalition within the broader context of your argument about liberalization and reformist drift in the women’s movement? Are they also seeking merely a share in existing structures, or are they doing something more transformative?

You know, the only permanent thing in life is change. So yes, we should expect that the modes of organizing will evolve. Even if the social conditions remain largely the same, we can’t expect the tools, spaces, and formats of activism to remain as they were 30 or 40 years ago. The infrastructure has changed, the technologies have changed, and so, too, has the landscape of activism. But to me, what matters more than whether we’re organizing online or offline is the content of that organizing—the issues being taken up, the ideological grounding behind them. That’s where I see the major rupture. Today’s organizing—whether it’s happening on digital platforms or through registered NGOs—is overwhelmingly driven by a reformist logic that dovetails neatly with the neoliberal agenda.

Much of what passes for feminist activism today is shaped by the imperatives of donor projects. These projects come with predefined goals, timelines, and metrics. They often say: “This year we’re focusing on girl-child education” or “We’re tackling online bullying.” And you’re expected to fall in line with that framework. There’s no space—or no encouragement—to ask deeper questions about the structures that produce these problems in the first place. And even when space does exist, we’re often too preoccupied with managing our own small organizational empires to use it. It’s not that no gains are being made. Of course things have changed. There’s more awareness. People talk differently, raise their children differently, even think differently about gender roles. But awareness, on its own, is not transformation.

The difference between the old movement and what we have now is that the former, even if it didn’t succeed fully, had its sights set on systemic transformation. It wanted to dismantle the structures that created inequality. Today, what we have is a politics of adjustment—of managing the system more equitably, not transforming it. Whether it’s Girls’ Power Initiative or Feminist Coalition or any number of empowerment programs, they often end up offering what neoliberalism does best: a pound of flesh taken in silence, covered up with a shiny bandage. And we get so dazzled by the bandage—the funding, the hashtags, the policy wins—that we forget what we lost in the process. What we’ve received often diminishes us, even as we’re told it’s empowering.

Yes, there are real changes. Social norms have shifted. There’s more cultural openness to women’s participation, and young people especially are more exposed to feminist ideas. But these changes haven’t translated into political power. The political sphere remains tightly controlled by a class that ensures nothing truly destabilizes their dominance. They may concede symbolic victories—quotas, visibility, affirmative action—but none of it touches the root. And that’s my concern. Feminist organizing today tends to focus on negotiating inclusion: 35 percent representation, policy engagement, protection measures. These are short-term gains, and we celebrate them as milestones. But what we’ve stopped doing is asking why those protections are necessary in the first place. Why are women so impoverished that social protection becomes essential? What is the system that created this vulnerability, and why aren’t we naming it, challenging it, seeking to undo it?

We want a system that, at its core, gives women genuine power and men the capacity for real appreciation and understanding. Because when we talk about feminist transformation, it cannot simply be about how many women are in school, or how many women hold seats in Parliament. Those numbers matter—but the deeper question is: How are those numbers shifting the underlying social orientation? Are they changing how power is defined and distributed in society? Are they altering how we think about gender, about who a woman is, who a man is, and what roles they are meant to play?

We’ve had national suffrage since 1979. Legally, every Nigerian has the right to vote and to be voted for. But in practice, barriers remain. Now we’re demanding 35 percent affirmative action for women in Parliament—but how does that address the root of the problem? Does it shift the structures that produce exploitation and inequality? Or are we simply slotting women into pre-existing roles without changing the game itself?

That’s why, for me, what matters most is not just the method of organizing—whether it’s online, grassroots, or institutional—but the content. What are we organizing for? What outcomes are we seeking? And not outcomes measured by headcounts or conference attendees, but by the extent to which we are driving transformative change. Are we redistributing power? Are we restructuring relationships between classes and genders? Development must be about more than inclusion. It must be about equality, about power, and about dignity.

We talk about women’s rights, but we don’t always talk about the rights that are denied in private spaces—the home, the family, the realm of care work. Our programming tends to focus on the public space: law, policy, advocacy. But how are we transforming the private space? The domestic sphere remains a core site of women’s oppression, and it shapes what women can or cannot do in public life. Even something as basic as one’s ability to attend a political meeting, or participate in paid labor, is often shaped by conditions inside the home.

What we are doing now, whether online or offline, is largely defined, constrained, and funded by neoliberal systems. And those systems place limits on how far we can go. They define the problem, set the agenda, and box in our imagination. So we end up tweaking the system, not transforming it. We make it more inclusive, perhaps, but we don’t ask what kind of system it is in the first place—and who it serves.

We need to go beyond counting. It’s fine to celebrate more girls in school or more women in employment. But feminism must demand more. We cannot talk about progress while class oppression remains intact. The women’s movement cannot only be about women moving forward. It must ask: How does the change in women’s status translate into a deeper transformation of society? When a woman gains economic power, does she also gain political voice? And does that political voice enable her to challenge systems, not just navigate them?

This also requires a shift in men. We need a model of change where men are empowered to appreciate and sustain women’s empowerment. When we talk about education, we should also talk about who decides what education is, who defines the curriculum, who shapes policy. That’s what power means. It’s not just about inclusion; it’s about authorship and authority. Who decides where you work, how you work, how much you earn? These are the questions of power, and they remain unaddressed.

Take the recent case of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan. She’s an educated, prominent woman. And yet look at how she was treated when she made a public allegation of sexual assault against the Senate president. What power does a woman like her actually hold when the entire political establishment closes ranks? These are not isolated incidents. They expose the enduring strength of patriarchal power and the limitations of token representation.

You’re already speaking to what was going to be my next question. You’re a perfect podcast guest for that reason.

Exactly. And I think it’s important to linger here, because your framing helps us see the broader implications of this recent scandal in the Nigerian Senate. I’m referring to the suspension of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan after she accused the Senate president of sexual assault. As you’ve said, this case touches directly on the issues you’ve raised—political empowerment, structural inequality, and the limits of representation. But I’m curious to hear your thoughts more explicitly. Given that many people already view the political class—male and female alike—as corrupt or compromised, do you think this moment could still become a kind of rallying cry? Could it deepen feminist struggle within this broader political context?

For me, the recent developments only underscore the point I’ve been making: The women’s movement cannot limit itself to reforming patriarchy. It must also confront class inequality and power relations rooted in class dynamics. When people talk about Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, they often point out that she belongs to the same class as many of the men in power. But even within that shared class, patriarchy is still weaponized against her. That’s what we mean when we talk about double oppression. A woman can occupy the same class position as a man, yet still be undermined and attacked because of her gender.

That’s why feminist politics must go beyond representation. It’s not just about how many women are in Parliament or how many women are holding office. We have to ask: What kind of women are in these spaces? What are they doing there? What power do they really hold? What agendas are they advancing? In the current National Assembly, there are four women. One is under attack, and the others have not publicly supported her. In fact, they’ve distanced themselves. And why? Because their presence in that space is still shaped by male authority. The power they wield is not their own; it is borrowed, permitted, tolerated.

Even Natasha herself felt the pressure of this gendered terrain. She rushed into marriage in 2022 because, by her own account, she was being dragged and demonized for being a single woman in politics. Meanwhile, a single man—say, a pastor—can become a governor and no one blinks. But a woman is called names, sexualized, vilified, dismissed as unserious. And all of this because we still haven’t uprooted the deep cultural logic of patriarchy. So we must ask: Are we merely increasing women’s numerical presence, or are we shifting the terms of political engagement?

We also have to look at how these women are positioned. Are they setting the agenda, or is the agenda being imposed on them—through their party, their families, their husbands? With Natasha, there’s been speculation about whether her political path was shaped by her marriage or by her own vision. Regardless, she still symbolizes something powerful. That campaign she ran in Kogi, the sheer drama and energy of it—if nothing else, it said women, too, can play this game. If you want to go rough, we can go rough. If you want to play it straight, we can do that too. That message matters.

But still, we must separate the political theatrics from the deeper issue. When Natasha made her allegation of sexual harassment against the Senate president, the response was predictable. People questioned her credibility. They demanded evidence. They rushed to recall her. But statistics tell us that a staggering number of women—some say one in five, others more—will experience sexual harassment before the age of 50. And most of these experiences are never reported, never spoken about. Often, even women themselves don’t name it for what it is.

Within the women’s movement, we’ve seen deep divisions on this issue. There’s still a lack of understanding about what sexual harassment really represents. At its core, it is about power. The victim is made vulnerable not because she is weak economically, but because of the power imbalance that comes with gender. Maleness, in our society, comes preloaded with power. Womanness is automatically read as vulnerable, as lacking. That’s the logic of patriarchy. And unless we’re naming that clearly—unless we’re making that part of our public and political education—we’re failing.

Even someone like Natasha, who has class power, financial standing, and political weight, couldn’t come forward immediately. She lacked the courage to speak, even to her husband. She couldn’t slap the man in that moment. And that tells you everything you need to know about how entrenched this system is. If someone like her can be made to feel small, then what about the rest of us?

What we learn from this situation is that empowerment must go beyond visibility or holding office. A woman may be politically empowered on paper, but is she psychologically empowered? That’s the deeper question. The Natasha episode reveals just how much work we still have to do in reorganizing feminist politics. We need to be more deliberate in naming the subtle but powerful forces that continue to keep women silent—even when they occupy positions of formal authority. Visibility is not enough. You can be a governor, a senator, a CEO, and still be demeaned by the gender role society has assigned you. Until we dismantle that system, women will continue to experience this tension between surface-level empowerment and underlying subordination.

Imagine a system that truly recognized equality—political, economic, and social—between men and women. In such a world, no man would stand up in the Senate chamber and try to discredit a woman by pointing to her beauty or to the number of men she’s been with, as if that has any bearing on her competence or dignity. And yet, that’s exactly what happened. A male senator could shamelessly say, “Do you know how many husbands she had before this one?” And no one challenges him. Meanwhile, no one scrutinizes the private lives of men in power. Until we reach a point where a woman’s dignity is beyond question—where she is not reduced to her sexuality or relationships—then we cannot speak of true empowerment.

Political power, financial power, employment—these matter. But real empowerment includes psychological strength and social affirmation. A woman must be able to hold her head high, knowing she is not alone, knowing that even if she speaks out against someone like Akpabio, she will be heard, protected, and affirmed. But what happens instead? Many women stay silent, not because they don’t know what’s right but because they fear how their husbands will react or how society will judge them. They fear that speaking out will bring shame, not justice.

This is why I say: Economic empowerment must go hand in hand with psychological empowerment. And not just for women—for men too. Social orientation has to shift. We need to develop a deeper political consciousness, one that enables both women and men to understand power, inequality, and the systems that sustain them. When a woman gains economic power, what does she do with it? Does it lead to critical reflection on the structures of exploitation? Does it help her question the relations of production that made her vulnerable in the first place? That’s the kind of transformation we should be striving for.

In Natasha’s case, she is fortunate—her voice is strong, and her husband appears to support her. That makes a difference. She’s not being called a prostitute, at least not in the same way she might have been if she were unmarried. That kind of public shame isn’t hanging over her head. But imagine if she weren’t married. Imagine if her husband had remained silent, or worse, blamed her, distanced himself, or left the home altogether. Would she still stand as tall as she does today?

Now imagine the reverse: a husband so emotionally and politically grounded that his wife could immediately tell him, “This is what just happened to me.” Imagine him responding not with doubt, but with fire: “You were elected by the people—not by Akpabio. The next time he tries that, just turn around and slap him.” That’s the kind of solidarity we need. That’s the kind of psychological shift that must accompany structural change.

Comrade, I’m mindful that we’ve kept you for quite some time. We had a few more questions prepared, but perhaps we’ll just ask one last one before we let you go—I know it’s the end of your day. This question builds on where you were ending just now. It’s about the future of the feminist movement in Nigeria. I don’t want to force you into an optimistic position, but I’m curious whether you see any coherence beginning to emerge—maybe as a result of the Natasha Senate scandal, or perhaps in light of the intensifying economic crisis and broader social shifts. Do you see signs that women are beginning to organize in a more unified way?

And connected to that, I’d love to hear your reflections on women in the labor movement. Are there any new trends or organizing strategies emerging from within the trade unions? Are there lessons we can draw from there? Or are we, unfortunately, left to take our cues from Nigerian banks, which increasingly boast about having more female CEOs—just to provoke you a little with that last comment. But really, I’m curious about what you see emerging, whether there are any green shoots of possibility.

Well, let me start by saying—I don’t have a problem with numbers. My concern is always: What are those numbers doing? How are they transforming anything? I don’t care if every Nigerian bank is run by women. That’s fine. But the question is: How does it lead to transformation? What does it mean for the vast majority of women in this country?

Now, in terms of prospects and lessons from what’s happening around us—including the Natasha case—I do see some encouraging signs. I’m seeing a bit more courage. People are beginning to tread into spaces they previously avoided. For example, sexual harassment has long been treated as a taboo issue. It wasn’t discussed seriously, and as a result, it wasn’t understood deeply. The woman who came forward was always punished, insulted, or shamed. But now, I think, we’re slowly opening up a space for more honest conversation. And with that comes deeper understanding.

Since the Natasha incident, I’ve been in meetings where people are really beginning to grasp how sexual harassment functions—not just as a violation of the body, but as a tool for demeaning everything a woman has achieved. It erodes dignity. It demoralizes. It tarnishes the years of work and success a woman has accumulated. So this conversation is becoming more layered. People are also beginning to talk about how sexual harassment itself can be weaponized—how it can be used strategically, and what safeguards are needed. These are important conversations, and I believe they will influence how women organize politically going forward.

What I also see happening is a shift in the conversation around representation. It’s no longer just about having more women in politics—it’s about the kind of women, the quality of that representation. Out of four women in the National Assembly, one was attacked and the other three stayed silent. That tells us something. And now, people are asking: Is this the kind of representation we want? Do we just want to fill seats with women, or do we want feminist advocates in those seats?

We’re also seeing efforts to build stronger links between the women’s movement in civil society and women in political office. Historically, those links were weak. You’d wait until there was a crisis before mobilizing support. But now, people are talking about how to support women not just to get into those positions, but to stay there—to thrive there. That shift in thinking, that long-term view, is very promising. It’s leading to more education, more awareness, and efforts to bring men into the conversation—not just as allies but as co-learners. The hope is to create spaces where women can speak and act without fear of contradiction, shame, or retaliation.

Now, as for the trade unions—the situation is more dire. The labor movement in Nigeria is at one of its weakest points politically. It has been severely weakened by the neoliberal agenda. Earlier, I mentioned how student unions, the women’s movement, even professional associations like the Bar and the Medical Association, were all targeted. The trade unions were the hardest to crack—but eventually, they were hit too. And that weakening wasn’t sudden. It was a gradual erosion.

Today, the trade unions are not politically equipped to engage the national question. They’ve been de-linked from their foundational mandate. Many union leaders no longer understand the relationship between their core mission—collective bargaining, fighting for a living wage—and the broader political economy. They don’t see that their ability to win those demands is shaped by the character of the leadership in government and how the economy is managed. If the economy is mismanaged, there are no factories, no jobs, and no dues-paying members. When that happens, unions are financially weakened. And once they are weakened, they become vulnerable to being bought off—offered token resources just to keep quiet.

This is the general condition of the trade union movement in Nigeria. And it mirrors the condition of women within those unions. If the union as a whole is politically weak, then its segments—including the women’s committees—are even more vulnerable. And because patriarchy is still deeply embedded in both the society and the trade union culture, the space for women’s leadership within the unions remains limited and contested.

The trade unions are supposed to be fierce. They’re supposed to be loud, strong, and unrelenting. That fighting spirit is their historical role—and the women within trade unions should embody that spirit as well. But the reality is that the women in trade unions are as weak—both in agenda and in action—as the trade union structures themselves. It’s not because these women are incapable or unwilling but because the overall system they are part of is so diminished. The broader patriarchal society has taken a heavy toll, and the leadership of these unions has become disconnected from society. They are not organizing. They are not agitating.

We still have trade union organizations today, yes. But the trade union movement is gone. It no longer exists in a meaningful sense. The organizations are weak, and the movement—something that once bound them together with purpose and direction—is even weaker. And so any component within these organizations, including women’s groups, reflects that same weakness. It is not because women workers are ignorant or apathetic. It is because the structure in which they operate is closed, hierarchical, and deeply patriarchal. It has lost touch with the social reality and the radical political consciousness needed to rebuild power.

Right now, even with the Natasha case dominating public conversation, the women in the trade union movement—whether in the NLC or TUC—are silent. As silent as the three women in the National Assembly who have yet to speak up. Why? Because within these unions, most women leaders do not win elections—they are selected by men. The men decide the agenda. The men set the tone. And unless you are given permission to speak, you do not speak. That’s how it works. The internal culture of patriarchy is deeply entrenched, and it has silenced women even within what should be progressive spaces.

So I’ll say this plainly: At this moment, the women within trade unions do not have the capacity to meaningfully engage. But that’s not the end of the story. What we can do—and what some of us are doing—is identifying women workers who are politically aware, who are angry, who are organizing—but doing so outside of the trade union structure. You will find them under the Socialist Workers League. You’ll find them organizing under different platforms—some within broader feminist movements, some in independent workers’ associations. They are organizing despite the trade union bureaucracy, not through it. Because the weakness of the structure makes it impossible for them to express themselves within the official union channels.

Comrade, I’m really grateful for those insights. You’ve offered such a critical, deeply grounded perspective—drawing from history, but also speaking with urgency about the present and the future. What you’ve said is not easy to hear, but I think you’re right that we have to begin with an honest assessment of where we are if we’re going to rebuild any kind of meaningful movement—whether feminist, labor-based, or pro-people more generally.

Thank you so much for taking the time to share this analysis with us, and for speaking with such clarity and generosity. I really hope we can have you back again, because these questions—about the trade unions, about the women’s movement, and about the legacy of Nigerian feminism—will only become more pressing as the situation continues to unfold. So once again: Thank you.

Thank you very much for having me. And don’t worry—you’re free to edit some of my long-winded talking.

Not at all! So much of what you’ve said is pure gold. Honestly, it’ll be hard to know what not to include—we’ll probably use most of it.

Thank you so very much for having me.