By Muhammad Nur Tijani
Kano State Government on Sunday empowered 1,500 women with N15 million to mark International Women’s Day (IWD).
The wife of the Governor, Hajiya Hafsat Ganduje, who distributed the money in Kano, said that the gesture was done to empower women in the state.
Ganduje, who was represented by the wife of the Deputy Dovernor, Hajiya Hafsat Gawuna, identified women as important component of the society.
She said the state government had been making giant strides toward ensuring that women became valuable assets to the society.
She added that the present administration succeeded in rehabilitating and re-activating skill acquisition centres across the state and ensured maximum utilisation of such centres for various women empowerment programmes.
She noted that “we successfully trained over 8000 women in different areas of trade and supported them with cash and materials to establish small businesses for their sustainance.
“We also trained 200 female youths in auto-mechanic at PAN Kaduna. The women were selected from the 44 local government areas of the state and 484 wards.”
She said that the state government collaborated with Industrial Training Fund (ITF) and trained over 300 females on tomato preservation, Video and Photography, event management, plumbing and essential items, among others.
She said that 200 women were supported with mini trucks for refuse collection from households for a fee.
The governor’s wife assured that the present administration would provide more funding to Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development for more innovative projects around agricultural value chain for women and other empowerment programmes.
According to her, the rise of women in a society is not the fall of men but a means of ensuring that the society benefits from the strength and weaknesses of each other.
Hajiya Zahra’u Muhammad, the state’s Commissioner for Women Affairs and Social Development, said “the IWD is a global day for the celebration of the Social, Economic, Cultural and Political achievements of women all over the world.”
Celebration annually on March 8 across the globe, IWD was proposed by German revolutionary, Clara Zetkin during 1910 International Socialists wWmen’s Conference.
The conference was to sensitise women and the society on the need to join hands to ensure women contributions and participation to the development of the society. (NAN)
