Senators fear Gender equality bill will turn women to prostitutes, lesbians –Senator Abaribe

According to Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe who
represents Abia South Senatorial District in the
senate, many senators turned down the Gender
Equal Opportunities Bill because they feared it
will turn some women to prostitutes and
lesbians.
The bill which was turned down by the senate
on March 15th, was designed to address
women's freedom of movement, female
economic activity, girls' access to education,
equal rights for women in marriage, divorce,
property/land ownership and inheritance,
appropriate measures against gender
discrimination in political and public life and
prohibitions of violence to women.
According to Premium Times, Abaribe said this
while speaking at a forum on political rights of
women in Nigeria organised by the Civil
Resource Development and Documentation
Centre (CIRDDOC) in Abuja yesterday April 13th.
“The bill was defeated at the second reading
when its details were highlighted to the
senators. Some lawmakers started expressing
deep worries about some parts of the bill that
they think could give women too much freedom
and lead them to prostitution, lesbianism and
other social vices.
The reason why we’re here is that we think that
we should be able to restrategise, we should be
able to look at the bill again and see those
contentious areas we may need to modify. We
should be able to find those critical
constituencies within the senate that we must
have to address. We should be able to look at
the narrative of the bill and how it is being
presented to the public and change that
narrative and make it a positive narrative. For
example, the bill is not a north versus south bill.
The bill is not a Christian versus Muslim bill.
The bill is not a male versus female bill. The bill
simply seeks to extend to every Nigerian all the
rights that are they should enjoy. And if women
by virtue of our culture, by virtue of our historic
antecedents are being behind, then we need to
also drag them into the economy by giving them
every right that they can use to be productive
members of the society and that is all that
we’re trying to do.”he said