Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Hajiya Imaan Suleiman-Ibrahim fsi has called on women to embrace leadership training to fit nto opportunities in educational leadership at different levels.
The Ministér dropped the charge while receiving the Registrar of the Teachers’ Registration Council of Nigeria, Dr. Ronke Soyembo who paid her a courtesy visit in her office.
The Minister noted with pride the huge number of women in the teaching profession put at over about 70 – 80 percent of overall figure of about four million teachers in the country.
She acknowledged that many women have grown to the position of being appointed principal in their schools, but urged them to go beyond that.
The Minister stressed that women were doing a lot of exploit in different fields nothing that their achievements were not being well reported as appropriate. This is even as she stressed the need to interrogate the national data which support 50:50 population ratio of female to their male counterparts, citing female domination in teaching, Agriculture, care economy and many more.
The Ministér pledged to collaborate with the TRCN on relevant issues of concern to the ministry saying that it is Paramount to achieving the objectives of the Renewed Hope Agenda of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu GCFR to maximize scarce resources, building stronger institutions that enhance value.
Specifically, she said the collaboration will include issue of out of school children put at between 16 to 18 million and child marriage believed to be due to economic reasons with the attendant consequences.
Hajiya Imaan dismissed the suggestion that religious beliefs were responsible for child marriage, arguing that many religious leaders have their children doing exploit in sophisticated schools across the world. Other areas of concern she said are personal hygiene of school children and sex education. The Minister acknowledged the controversies trailing how sex education is handled in some countries, but stated that fortunately, Nigeria does not have such extreme stance on the issue. “With our own value system,we need to agree on how best to deliver sex education to our children”, she said.
On politics, the Minister urged the women to take advantage of their huge population and participate actively in the electoral processes
Earlier, the Registrar of TRCN Dr. Ronke Soyembo who led the delegation to the Minister, briefed her on some of the operations of the Council.
She told the Minister that Nigeria has about four million teachers with about 70 to 80 percent of them as women, adding that the TRCN had fully uploaded names of every certified teacher on the radar of the Councilwww.trcn.org.ng, charging employers of teachers to check the registration status of the teachers before engaging them.
According to her, the Council was packaging a six months accelerated professionalization pathway targeting all uncertified teachers who have been operating for the past two years at least across the country towards their professionalization and certification.
Speaking further, the TRCN boss warned that after the six months programme being planned by the Council in conjunction with the Federal Ministry of Education and the National Teachers’ Institute, any teacher, not certified by the Council must not be seen in the classroom.
Dr Soyembo said that irrespective of whether a person graduated with first class from the University, it does not mean such a person can teach.
She asked for collaboration in the areas of data sharing and support for the accelerated training programme especially for indigent candidates.
Ahmed Lawan Danbazau mnipr
Head, Press and Public Relations Dept.
