Professor Motunrayo Olumakaiye is the Professor of Public Health Nutrition, Obafemi Awolowo University. She is also the President of Women and Girls Organisation, Diocese of Lagos, Anglican Communion.
She is the wife of Rt. Rev. Dr. Humphrey Olumakaiye, the Lord Bishop of Lagos Diocese, the Diocesan, and Missioner. In this interview, she speaks on why women must use social media to train their children
Unemployment in Nigeria is alarming and the most affected people are women and youths, what is your take on this? Would you say women are not prepared for unforeseen circumstances or things happen suddenly?
The problem is not about women or the future or the country. Frankly speaking, the jobs are not there. I work in the University as a Professor and that is what we are addressing now.
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We are revising our curriculum to include entrepreneurship. This means that apart from getting the certificate, we need to graduate with skill, and universities are including it now.
Our summit in OAU has just approved that and an entrepreneurship studies centre has been established.
So, that as you are graduating, you would have learned skill so as to be self-dependent by the time, you go out of the university. So, it is about the situation in the country generally and not an individual.
The situation in the country is such that a First Class graduate still looks for white-collar jobs.
The government is not creating jobs but we do not have to rely on the government. We need to look inward to proffer solution to the problem of unemployment and that is by acquiring a skill.
We can start very small and then grow big. Women should not sit at home and expect that their husband’s meager salary or income will cater to every one of their needs.
As a woman, she needs to provide and support whatever the husband has been giving her. As women, we need to brace up and learn skills and be bold enough to market ourselves.
So, we need marketing strategies. Lots of people have skills but lack marketing strategies.
Issues of rape and domestic violence are happening in churches.
And when these happen, women keep silent claiming they do not want their children to be discriminated against. How have you been addressing this?
This interview is coming at the right time. In Diocese of Lagos, we have what we call Smart Parenting in a sexualised world.
The world is becoming sexualised and everything around you is suggestive. The advertisement has sex intonation, billboards, even the biscuit that children eat.
The way children are being raped is becoming so alarming such that parents need to know how to train up their children so that, they can resist anyone who tries to make advances towards them.
They should be able to talk to their parents. Most women are always very shy about talking to their children about sex. The children are well exposed to things we cannot imagine because of the devices on the ground.
Everybody is on the internet. Most children surf the internet and navigate the sites they are not supposed to go to.
We must start very early in life. Rape cases are pathetic and painful. We have heard of cases where stepfathers raped stepdaughters. We heard of a case of a 24-year-old man who raped a 3-year-old baby and the baby is dead now.
What is the role of Clergywomen in this?
We really have to be as smart as parents, as mothers. You have to befriend your child. It is not only for girls. Even the boys are vulnerable. We have heard of a 19-year-old boy who raped a 50-year-old woman recently.
Therefore as women, we need to be close to our children even from childhood. For instance, an a-12-year old girl recently asked when she should be preparing for marriage and someone replied that you are 12 years late.
The answer was that she should start preparing the day she is conscious of self. And that goes also with sex.
We have different things we can teach them from different ages. Right from 0-2 years, we have a syllabus for them, what to teach such a child when it comes to the issue of sex. We continue the teaching until they get to adolescence.
We have lots of myths now and if you are not the one that talks to your children about it, then they will be pushed to get the information from outside.
And the information from outside is usually wrong. If you have a boy or girl child, be bold enough to talk to them. Know the friends they keep. Most parents do not know the friends of their children.
You must be a friend to their friends, go to the social network. Most mothers are not on Facebook, they do not know the friends their children are chatting with or the friends they are keeping on social media.
As mothers, we need to be 21st century compliant. The world is becoming more dangerous and sensitive now and we must be prayerful. It is only God that can teach us the ways to teach the children in this sinful world.
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As a young and dynamic Clergy’s wife, you lead women of different age categories, how do you feel?
It is the grace of God. God makes all things beautiful in His own time. When God calls you, He equips you for the task. I knew God very early just I was rounding up my secondary school.
I got to the university; I was very vibrant spiritually in the fellowship. And during my NYSC, I got married to a man of God. It was a beautiful transition right from adolescence to spinsterhood, then becoming a married woman.
And it is because of the foundation that I had in Christ. The bible says if the foundation is destroyed, what can the righteous do?
With that, I got to the ministry and I started leading in a small group as an executive in my unit. I threw my total weight into the work of the ministry. My husband was the youth Chaplain and I was really involved in the youth activities. And bringing up young girls and ladies unto the Lord brought us to the position we are now.
The challenges…
One of the major challenges is availability on the part of the women. In Lagos, people are very busy. We have lots of programmes in the Diocese of Lagos among the women and many of them are gaining a lot. Lagos Diocese is a metropolitan city and we thank God that language is not a barrier
Advice for women of all ages
We should be very prayerful. There is nothing we can compare with prayers. You cannot train children with your own wisdom. God gives us these children and it is His wisdom that we need to nurture them.
We are advising mothers and fathers to create time for their children especially when they are growing up. Knowledge is power; when you acquire knowledge, we will be able to handle the situations that confront us as women.
The women wing of the Diocese of Lagos, Anglican Communion has been constantly engaging women in different areas; can you tell us some of those areas?
We have a lot of programmes we are doing in Lagos Diocese especially among the Women and Girls Organisation.
We have different sections for girls, ladies, women, and widows. Unemployment is common in Nigeria, lots of people do not have jobs and so, we felt there was a need to empower those people so as to be up and doing.
For instance, not all the Clergy wives in Lagos Diocese are fully employed, some are underemployed while some are not employed.
We have empowered the women in the area of Adire fabrics using old or faded fabrics and transform them to new ones. It is turning trash to treasure. Turning waste to wealth. We have also taught them some vocational skills including catering, art-making, bead making, decoration through Abigail Oluwole Vocational Centre.
We trained both girls and boys free. The training is fully funded by the women of the Diocese.
We have lots of young widows and we have programmes for them too. We have taught some skills including soap making, insecticides among others.
For the young widows, are they encouraged in any way by the church to get married again?
Yes, if they desire to remarry, we encourage them but many of them rather prefer to train their children alone instead of being married again. Some of them have their jobs. Some are empowered and monitored.
Those that desire to remarry, we encourage them to prayerfully do so without making mistakes. If there is anyone who feels that after the demise of the husband, she does not want to remarry, then we let it be.
The post Why sexual abuse exists even in the church — Prof Olumakaiye appeared first on Vanguard News.
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