The Challenge of the Nigerian Man Desiderata -By Loretta Oduware Ogboro-Okor

It began when I sent out my quote to my friends in commemoration of the International Women`s Day.

Me: “We choose to Challenge conventional beliefs that limit the positive actualisation of women….so we can make sure, we all understand that women have no limits. Join us, push the boundaries, and disrupt some norms. Happy IWD 2021 #MyFathersDaughter”

He called and said: What you have written about, with this quote, is a serious matter oo! It is still endemic and deeply rooted in our African culture and tradition. Good morning.

Me: I know. Hence, we move.

He replied: Hmmmmm…in my immediate maternal family, there were no male children before me.

Me: There were only us women (yippee)

He replied: My maternal Grandfather, sacked my maternal Grandmother. He sent her packing because she could not give him a male child.

Me: I can imagine the strength those women at the time displayed despite the limitations of culture, tradition, and finances. Imagine him sending her packing like he was not the one, giving her the X chromosomes that made her have all female children. These men do not realise that they are the ones who determine the sex of their children and not the women.

He replied: My Grandmother gave birth to three daughters. My own mother was the eldest of the three.

Me: I see. I never knew this.

He replied: Hmmmmm…. My Grandfather decided to marry another woman to give him the almighty male child.

Me: Great… and did that work for him because I suspect he is the one in charge of the girl’s production line. (Laughing)

He replied: The second wife gave birth to two children. Both were girls.

Me: Ops……trouble no get end.

He replied: My Grandfather then sacked wife number two because she too, could not give birth to a male child.

Me: (Laughing) Why do you use the word ‘sack’?

He replied: Please stop laughing, this is not funny…. this is one of the retrogressive things that has held back our people. The operative work is ‘sack’ because in my mind, I think he sadly thought making a male child was a job for which he employed and fired workers at will.

Me: I get you…. I apologise. I am not laughing at your Grandfather, but I laugh so as not to start weeping for the blanket unawareness of our people.

He replied: (Now very pensive and sounding deep in thought) My Grandfather went on, to marry wife number three, who came in, and gave birth to only one child, a female. He sacked her, just like he did her predecessors, for her incompetence in the male child production department.

Me: Na wah…. wonderful, so where did the “holy grail” for the male child dock next?

He replied: He married a fourth wife, who gave birth to two children, again, females. At this time, he had become too old, to remarry.

Me: hmmmmm…. the case of the aging equipment (oops)

He replied: (He was still lost in thought and far away…he did not notice my bait to get him to smile) Because of the importance our tradition bestowed and still to a large extent attaches to having male children, my Grandfather and many more like him, did not see the need to send any of their daughters to school. Instead, he spent his resources on serial marriage ceremonies in a quest for a son.

Me: Sadly so…

He replied: But thank God for my Grandmother the first of his wives. She engaged in trading, buying food ingredients from village markets, and transporting them to big markets in Benin for sale. She worked hard and saved to send her three daughters to school. She left him when the wives kept multiplying. She sacrificed and scrapped to educate all her daughters to University level.

Me: So, their mother struggled to ensure they all became graduates while their father was busy on his expedition to acquire a son so he could tick socio-cultural box on the examination sheet he had allowed his society to impose on him.

He replied: God bless all the strong women in our lives. All the strong women in this world.

Me: Amen

He replied: I was born, after my Grandfather married his fourth wife. (He laughed now. It was as if he was awakening from his reflective dreams). When he heard the news of my birth, that his first grandchild by his first daughter was a boy, my Grandfather was incredibly happy. He called the entire family together and had a huge celebration. Nothing else mattered to him except me. He requested my Grandmother to move back home…but she declined.

Me: He must still be very happy today, celebrating with all the Angels Mikey, Gabo and Ralph in Heaven just watching how well you turned out. But just imagine how much bigger his groove with the Angels would be if he had trained all those women God bestowed on him.

He replied: My point exactly. All the other children apart from my mother’s children were not educated. Their children too, were also short-changed because their mothers were not empowered.  Eventually, my grandfather passed on. The lesson he learnt was a grave one.

Me: Sadly, you are right

He replied: ……that a child is a child, irrespective of the sex.

Me: Na word you talk so. This is apt. We share his lesson and I feel your pain this morning.

He replied: He learnt late in his life that a female child can do very well. That a daughter can outperform and be better successful when compared to many a male child if she is not neglected and she is given proper education.

Me: True.

He replied: You see, before my Grandfather died, my mother built him a beautiful befitting house with the salary she saved up from her job with the University of Benin Teaching Hospital. She completely forgave his ignorance. The day he moved into the new house, he wept uncontrollably. He could not control his water works as he knelt and cried begging my mother for her forgiveness. Telling her to ask her mother to forgive him also. As he cried, he explained how he was so desperate to have a male child that he wasted all his resources and the money he earned as a teacher on women. He worked hard from bed to bed and could not build any house for himself. His shelter in his old age was the house my mother, who was trained by my rejected Grandmother built for him.

Me: Oh my God….this is deep!

He replied: I remember his words to my mother on the day she presented him with the house “I did not send you to school because you are not a male child, but your mother sent you to school. Despite that, you still built me a house and you never neglected me”.

Me: Please, can I ask your permission to share your story?

He replied: Please do. Today, I choose to speak with you to challenge old norms! We must stop that sad aspect of our culture that does not empower our daughters. We can keep all the other great things in our culture, by all means…but this marginalisation of our women must stop.

Me: You will be amazed that everywhere in the world, women still have to grapple with a lack of equity. True, some climes are worse than others, but the problem pervades under different guises.

He replied: We must all help to stop this. Nigerian Men, Edo Men, Men around the world must help. These women are our daughters, wives, sisters, they are a part of us. They make our burden light when we empower them.

Me: I thank men like you who choose to challenge conventional norms and stand up for us women. I appreciate women who choose to challenge societal ills and stand up for other women. Together, life go balance.

The 8^th of March 2021 was International Women`s Day. I received many calls and text messages in the preceding days about the import of the IWD. Many of them were asking my opinion on the theme, how relevant it is, what the day means to me. Some were requests to speak on what women can do, to balance the world for all. Nothing prepared me for how this Nigerian man has chosen to challenge conventional norms. Very few things surprise me. This did. I sought his explicit permission to write this…. he surprised me again….he did not think twice. He gave his consent almost like that was what he set out to do….and rightly so.

Now, for the records, this is a well-placed man in the Nigerian society. An unadulterated Edo State indigene and a proud son of Ancient Benin Kingdom.  One with deep rooted origins woven into the very fabric of Ancient Benin Kingdom. He has unalloyed loyalty to his roots which he wears like a medal on his chest and for this and much more, he earned my respect. I no longer have respect for him. That has changed. I now have monumental respect for him.

That he has dared to stand up and push the frontiers for something I have often advocated for. Something I have always professed is the one sure way to liberate societies since I was in Medical School. “Cultural Integration” is a concept of societal evolution I have preached; it is when people actively choose to lose what is not positive in their culture while adopting specifics that are positive in other culture(s), creating a better fusion without losing their innate identity. Culture, the way of life of any group of people, has the good, the bad and ugly. Thankfully, it is not static.

This son of Edo has taken on a crusade to empower women. His conversations with me above are an explicit poster of the synergy men bring to the fore in the “long walk to freedom” from the imbalance that negates the empowerment of women. We are not begging for it; we have earned it and together, we choose to challenge the push for balance not for one day only… but as part of our lifestyle.

Loretta Oduware Ogboro-Okor is author of the book, My Father’s Daughter