DID YOU KNOW? Women got only 3.5% of national assembly seats declared so far

Low female representation in Nigeria’s political space has over the years been a source of concern, especially because women make up 49 percent of the country’s population.

Prior to the 2023 general election, stakeholders were hopeful that there would be a significant improvement in female representation in the national assembly.

But the results released so far by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) suggest continued stagnation.

So far, out of the 423 national assembly seats declared by INEC, only 15 are occupied by women. This means women represent just 3.5 percent of the newly elected legislators while men take up the remaining 96.5 percent.

Although there are 469 legislative seats in the national assembly, INEC declared winners for 423 seats, with supplementary elections expected to be conducted in 46 constituencies.

Ipalibo Banigo, deputy governor of Rivers state, and Kingibe Ireti(pictured) of the Labour Party (LP) are the only women who won senate seats so far.

Women elected into the house of representatives include Orogbu Obiageli (Awka north/Awka south federal constituency), Nnabuife Chinwe Clara (Orumba north/ Orumba south federal constituency), Gwacham Mauren Chinwe (Oyi/Ayamelum federal constituency), Ebikake Marie Enenimiete (Brass/Nembe federal constituency), Akume Regina (Gboko/Tarka federal constituency), Onuh Onyeche Blessing (Otukpo/Ohimini federal constituency) and Zainab Gimba ( Bama/Ngala/Kala-Balge federal constituency).

Others are Ibori-Suenu Erhiatake (Ethiope east/Ethiope west federal constituency), Onuoha Miriam Odinaka (Isiala Mbano/Okigwe/Onuimo federal constituency), Beni Butmak Lar (Langtang North/Langtang south federal constituency), Goodhead Boma (Akuku Toru/Asari Toru federal constituency), Khadija Bukar Abba Ibrahim (Damaturu/Gujuba/Gulani/Tarmuwa federal constituency) and Fatima Talba (Nangere/Potiskum federal constituency).

Only 9% of candidates were women

According to INEC, a total of 1,101 candidates vied for senatorial seats while 3,122 contested for house of representatives seats.

The commission’s gender distribution breakdown showed that 3,840 men vied for national assembly seats – 1,008 for senate and 2,832 for the house of representatives. As for women, 380 contested; 92 for senate and 288 for the house of representatives.

In total, only nine percent of the over 4,000 national assembly candidates were women.

Based on the declarations done so far by INEC, only 3.9 percent of the 380 women who contested for national assembly seats were elected.

In 2019, 235 women contested for senate seats while only seven (6.42 percent) were elected. In the house of representatives, 533 women contested but only 11 (3.05 percent) were elected.