A man recently told me that every March, he watches “US” women put on a grand performance for International Women’s Day.
He said it’s like a well-rehearsed play—full of dramatic monologues about self-love, unity, and sisterhood. The world sees us standing together, hands clasped, chanting empowerment slogans like a coven casting a love spell on ourselves.
But behind the scenes? Oh, some are just staring at the calendar, counting down the days until the act is over.
The moment April hits, the unity evaporates like cheap perfume, and suddenly, the transformation begins—sweet smiles turn into smirks, words of encouragement morph into cutting remarks, and just like that, we go from Queens to “Witches and Bitches” overnight.
And let’s be real—when it comes to dragging another woman down, who takes the lead? “Women.” Forget men; they’re amateurs compared to us.
We’ll gather like an elite panel of judges, dissecting another woman’s choices, her looks, her success, her failures. We’ll chant “know your worth” one day and whisper “she’s doing too much” the next.
Then we turn around and wonder—”Why is it so hard to level up? Why do we keep hitting walls?
Sis, maybe it’s because every time a woman starts to rise, it’s not just the system pulling her down—it’s the very hands that once held hers in solidarity.
His words set me plundering. “Is there any truth in what he said?”
Is this grand display of sisterhood really just a beautifully decorated facade—one that crumbles the moment the cameras stop rolling and the hashtags stop trending?
I wanted to dismiss him, to call him bitter or out of touch. But as I sat with his words, a discomfort settled deep in my chest, because I knew— knew —there was something there.
How many times have we seen it? Women standing together in daylight, only to tear each other apart in the shadows. Women applauding success publicly, yet privately question, “Why her? Why not me?”
We chant empowerment, but when a woman dares to rise too high, we whisper, “She thinks she’s better than us.” We are the first to castigate, to judge, to scrutinize. And then we wonder why the doors never open wide enough for all of us to walk through.
I remember a quote from “Reflections of a Man, by Amari Soul: ““A woman’s biggest challenge isn’t the world. It’s other women.”
And I felt that. Because here we are, in 2025, with “Women’s Day” championing “Accelerating Growth.” But how possible is it—”really”—in this climate, in this facade, when the very women who should be in the room making the laws for other women are not even in the room?
And what of the Nigerian women fighting for 74 seats in the National Assembly?
Will this ever come true? Will we ever see a day when women don’t have to beg, fight, and bleed just to have a seat at the table meant for them? Or will we continue to watch from outside, pressing our faces against the glass, as the decisions that shape our lives are made Without Us?
How ironic is it that a man would lead women to the Beijing Conference? The then Permanent Secretary of Women’s Affairs, Dr Musa Bata, was a man? That in a country of millions of women, the face of their supposed empowerment was not one of their own?
And yet, this isn’t even the most ironic part.
Back in the day, the Governor of the Central Bank, Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, made a bold declaration—starting in 2014, all banks in the country would be required to appoint at least 30% female board members and 40% female management staff. A milestone for gender equity, right? A real push toward representation?
But Sanusi didn’t stop there. He called out the real problem, we whisper about but rarely admit publicly: “Women don’t help other women enough”.
“If you are a female minister and you spend four years on the cabinet and you cannot say after four years what you did for women during the period, shame on you. Not many women help other women, and this is really a big problem.”
And wasn’t he right?
Norway enforces a rule that 50% of board members must be women. But what did that actually change? Sanusi called them the “Golden Skirts”—the same elite group of women recycled from one board to another, while millions of women in villages remained trapped in poverty, dying in childbirth, lacking access to healthcare, education, and jobs.
“We want many skirts out there,” he said. “Not just at the top of the boardroom but reaching the women who need it most.”
He also made a case for “easier access to credit for women”, acknowledging that in a country where land and property titles are predominantly owned by men, most women couldn’t even qualify for a loan. The system was rigged from the start.
And now, in 2025, we have to ask—what’s the reality today?
Are those 30% board seats and 40% management positions filled with women who uplift other women—or are they just new faces on the same old game board? Did the female ministers Sanusi called out take up the challenge, or did they take their seats and forget the struggle?
And then there’s this—
The Law That Says a Nigerian Woman is Less Than a Man. A Nigerian woman cannot automatically pass on her citizenship to her foreign husband, yet a Nigerian man can do so for his foreign wife. This law buried in Section 26 of the Nigerian Constitution, is a blatant reminder that gender inequality is not just social—it is legal.
The law is structured to deny women equal rights in nationality and citizenship matters.
This is the same country where a widow is expected to shave her head, sleep on the floor, and prove she did not kill her husband, while a man can lose his wife today and remarry tomorrow without question.
Where a woman’s property is seized by her in-laws the moment her husband dies, yet a man gets to keep everything—without challenge.
Where a woman is ridiculed for not having children, but a man in the same position is excused with “God’s time is best.”
and
Where a girl is raised to shrink, to submit, to endure, while her brother is raised to rule.
And yet, we still ask: Where is the gender equality we so loudly preach?
The slogans are loud, the speeches are inspiring, and the hashtags are trending. But beyond the talk, beyond the perfectly curated Women’s Day campaigns—what has truly changed for the everyday woman in Nigeria?
Because if history has taught us anything, it’s this:
A seat at the table means nothing if you’re still not being served.
@hawie25
Hauwa Noroh Ali
March 6, 2025
