Women leader of Ohanaeze Lagos state, led by Chief Solomon Aguene Ogbonna, Barr. (Mrs) Victoria Odumegwu Ojukwu, has disclosed plans to unite the women, empower the widows and the less privileged ones among them, stating that the leadership has been very supportive in the projects and programmes of the women.
The women leader who made this assertion recently in a chat with newsmen in Lagos also spoke about her programmes and the expectations from her leadership as women leader and emphasized the need for peace and unity among the members.
According to her, “We are all expected to be our sisters’ keeper, to talk with one voice with love, project the culture of Igbo land among ourselves. And if we promote such culture, we will be able to interact freely and be able to assist each other in any material thing we are doing in each local government. And also be able to live in peace, with our neighbours, we are from different backgrounds, not Igbo speaking all.
“We will be able to live in peace, and promote friendship, we interact with them and know their own culture as the know us, we will do all to ensure that we have a good quality leadership. Transparent, helping each other, making sure that when we move, when they see us, we will be respected as women members of Ohanaeze Ndi Igbo anywhere we go. We will have that identity of good women in Igbo land.”
Responding to the question of what inspired her to accept the position of Women Leader of Ohanaeze Lagos State chapter, she said, “In any community where you have people from different communities, there must be some kind of misunderstanding or some quarrels among them. So we make sure we change this attitude of not being in harmony with one another.
“We try as much as possible to ensure that we cooperate with everybody. One mother may have six children, of different characters, but the mother will not throw away those ones that have bad characters. She will try as much as possible to encourage them to make them feel togetherness, you are my children.
“Let us ensure we don’t quarrel unnecessarily in this time and age that the economy is so bad, people are not happy, so we try as much as possible to make peace, we bring everybody together. Let us live in peace, among ourselves, then we can extend it to our neighbours, when they see us living in peace, they will want to be like us. And we know that with God on our side, we will definitely succeed.”
She expressed optimism in her ability to manage the women. She further said, “It is possible; a woman with six children should expect serious misunderstanding among the children from time to time. But she has to use her brain to curb unnecessary bitterness and quarrels among her children. We cannot say because this one is bad, she doesn’t want me to exist in my father’s or mother’s house, then you throws away that child. No. Call them; try your best to ensure that they don’t carry the quarrel to an extreme.
“That needs perseverance, advising, and encouraging, love with one voice we talk one voice. Not finding faults, we don’t want to find faults. That is part of the things we decided today.
“Don’t look for faults, don’t quarrel, there must be decorum, let’s start planning from point of view, we will be able to achieve all our goals and objectives. If the people believe we cannot have peace we can.
“Definitely, we can depend on who is handy, because a quarrel with B, B goes to tell D, D goes to befriend C and they start quarrelling, if the mother is there, and she says you stop that, it’s not good.
“By our constitution, we will be able to handle each and every problem that comes our way. And I believe God will see us through.”
Speaking further on her plans to move the women forward, she said, “To move with love, recognize your sisters, respect your family and your household. Respect the association, show me your friend and I will tell you, who you are. We are able to make sure that we are able to empower those who don’t have anything to do.
“Sometimes, idleness brings sadness, a hungry man is the devils workshop, an angry person can do all sorts of things. We make sure that there is peace and then, we move forward by following our constitution, trying to see some of our sisters that actually need help because sometimes when they are idle they go to destroy other people by slandering or gossips about some people.
“We try as much as possible to see that each and every individual woman is engaged in a lucrative job. This step will help to avoid them doing unnecessary idleness, because an idle person is a devil’s workshop. That is usually the beginning of the problem.
“We have marshaled out how we are able to move to meet our patrons, doing some competitions, where we print out tickets, people will come and watch, different community activities, like in Igbo land, it is done so, and we can replicate it and modify it in different communities with different styles, we do it as an exhibition, we can do dancing, we can do many other things, craft, we will put it up and invite well meaning Igbos, I know Igbo will come and see our culture. And then, we will meet our stakeholders, our matrons and our patrons to support us, so when the money comes in like that, we will be able to save.
“We have already used the money given to us by our president to open an account. Any money that comes in, we will be able to know how much we have. We will do it local government by local government, that is how we intend to achieve that.”
Asked whether President Solomon Aguene Ogbonna is backing her vision and plans, she said, “Our able president Solomon Aguene Ogbonna has been fantastic, he has been a wonderful president, he has been so supportive. In fact, there is nothing we do without letting him know.
“Before we carry out the project to come to meeting to announce to the women, I must have discussed it with him with the Excos, the way we move forward. There are many things in our agenda, and the women are happy. You saw how happy they were when the president came in. We have never had this type of meeting before.
“All our pray is when we present it to our president, this is what we intend to achieve, before the end of the year or before one year tenure, he will help us, we also allow our stakeholders to join in our meetings, with the president to assist us in going about it
“So from there, we meet our local government chairmen, we will also introduce this beautiful project and then, people who are in support of what we are doing will be able to assist us. He has been so wonderful our president Udochia O God, he is wonderful.”
What of the widows, how are you going to take care of them?
Barr Ojukwu further disclosed that widows and other less-privileged women would receive priority as regards empowerment.
According to her, “If you look, there are many widows among us, they are mostly part of this project, so we look at them first, even though, some women have their husbands alive, but the women do suffer like the widows.
“The women seem to be like the bread winners, they struggle left, right, and centre to make sure that their home is comfortable. So the widows are the most vulnerable, we look at their situation; there are some richer widows, who can even sponsor one or two widows.
“So, we look at those widows who are a little bit comfortable and who can also assist the less privileged widows, it is a voluntary something. It is a charity work. So if we appeal to them, they can take up one or two widows to assist them with any project that they are comfortable with. Not really making everything very comfortable we have to be accountable for everything that is given to us.”
She appealed to other women to join the group and conduct themselves with respect and decorum worthy of emulation.