Former Senate Majority Leader, Senator Mulikat Akande Adeola, who was elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), recently won the ticket of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) for a chance to return to the Senate. She speaks to ENE OSHABA on why she changed platform among other issues.
You Senate Majority Leader on the platform of the People Democratic Party (PDP) but now you are running for the Senate on a different platform. Why did you move to a new party?
You know SDP is not a new party. For me, I never believed in jumping ship, moving from one party to another. Since 1998 I have been in the PDP so there must be a genuine reason for me to have moved.
I would rather be in a party that I’ve helped to build, but when because we have a new government and the government is not ready to carry people along, then it’s not even about me, it’s about my people. If the people who work to bring the government to power are not carried along, I’m just one person.
I don’t have to be in power every time I contested House of Representatives in 2015 I didn’t win. I contested the Senate they still worked against me, the same group of men that we are talking about and I’m still here.
Contesting any position is about service to me. So, when you deny me the ticket, you are denying the people the opportunity to have the best that’s the way I see it. So, going to SDP is an opportunity to once again do what I have done before, that is to be able to represent my people adequately and do the needful for them. So, I am running for the Oyo North Senatorial seat.
Considering the number of voters at the grassroots and you are contesting under a relatively new party, how do you think you can win the people’s heart?
I’ve been there since 1998; I’m still the same Mulikat Akanbi Adeola. So, I have always been at the grassroots. I was in the House before I contested the Senate. The last time I went down to my 14 local governments. So I’m a household name, they know me very well.
I’m sure you know that the Nigerian electorate today is not about the party. If you look at the parties, you must have one thing or the other to say about everything so they’re looking out for the right people.
What new strategy are you bringing to the table especially since you said that your people are not getting what’s due them?
Yes, because when you help bring the government into power, if you are a party member you expect in one way or the other to be compensated. However, if you are not getting anything it is like being cheated and the most painful thing is that those who didn’t even work for the government are the ones who are there. That is the most painful aspect. You know what I mean?
When I say getting something, I’m not talking in monetary terms. There are qualified people who can be offered appointments and all that, so all of the people who worked with me to bring the government to power today were not given anything. Since I’m not in any particular position, I tried to do my best for them but my best will not reach out to everybody.
They believe in me. So for somebody like me, if I can say let’s move, and they all move with me, definitely, I believe they will stand by me they stand by me this time around.
You were not on good terms with your late governor; won’t this affect your ambition?
We were on good terms before he died; four days before he died he was at my daughter’s wedding in January. So, we had made up already. You know he left the party as well. He was no longer in the PDP.
So, are you banking on his supporters?
I am banking on God. You can’t bank on anything about politics; you just bank on God and what you have to offer. You know, like I said, running for office is about service to me, it’s our service to society. So if you want to X-ray what it takes, I believe I have what it takes to represent our people in the Senate.
Are you confident of getting support of your fellow women?
I’ve never accepted the saying that women don’t support each other because I have the support of women in my place.
I always support women not just if the person is a woman but because the woman is capable not just because she is a woman. If you’re a woman, you want to come and compete with a man you must be able to match him whether we’re talking of qualification, capacity, capability and all that. It’s not just about being a woman. So, for a woman to come out, you must also look at your opponent and know that the person also has something better to offer.
Recently I sat down and I thought about all the stakeholders/people who are involved with elections. They know me by name; some of them don’t even know me in person. You don’t even know my capacity. You don’t know what I can offer. So, I thought of bringing in all those who are connected with elections? Not necessarily the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), all those who are connected with elections I’m talking about the stakeholders like YIAGA, the monitoring teams, the journalists and all of that, because when you hear Mulikat outside you’ll be able to say something about her.
I’m also expecting a feedback. I expect a lot of contributions; I expect a lot of advice. I want to tell you the challenges you know that I’ve been facing as a woman and I expect that you’re going to give me some helpful tips towards this and all that, and visibility.
I don’t know if there’s anything else I’ve tried. So, I want to hear from you too but it’s a way of bringing people together as a networking event sort of for women and the issue of gender is in the fore because I’m a woman and we know that way it is for women in Nigeria, for women to get to any particular position.
Talking about gender, the major political parties do not have a female presidential aspirant despite the push the Wife of the President, Aisha Buhari. What is your take on this?
There was no concession whatsoever. Now, am I going to say I won’t vote for those who have come forward? No, we can’t say that. But you see, even those who we are going to be voting for should have a covenant with the women that they are going to do this for them when they get there.
The Nigerian women must hold them to account, they must be able to tell us what they will do for women otherwise we would just be wasting our time because it’s garbage in garbage out.
Each government will come to promise, heaven and earth but at the end of the day there is nothing. You don’t get anything. So if the Nigerian women, if we’re really serious, we must speak with one voice, we must come together and ensure that these Presidential candidates deliver because in Nigeria power is in the hands of the president and governors. If they say we should have three women we would have three women which should not be the case but the women should hold these people accountable at the end of the day.
In the legislature where I was before, women have done far better in touching lives, in reaching out to people in society but I don’t know what the men are afraid of. They should allow women to have Affirmative Action because that would help. In Kenya and most of these East African countries they went by Affirmative Action and today we can see the gains in their society. If you deny the women, you are denying your country progress and development and that is what Nigerians don’t know right now.
Still on the women agenda, what’s your assessment of women struggle?
There is the need to align quantity and quality in terms of women representation and conversation around what forms Affirmative Action are important factors to usher more women into political spaces.
I found it very disconcerting to note that the numerical gains which women had recorded as from 1999 when we returned to civilian rule, had gradually diminished in the years following and especially in 2015.
After the 2015 elections, women made up 21 out of the 360 members of the House of Representatives and eight out of 109 members of Senate.
In 2011, we had nine female Senators and 25 female members of the House of Representatives this is against what we had in 2007, when there were nine female Senators and 27 members of the House of Representatives.
The above figures indicate that we had been unable to retain and also to exceed the numerical gains if federal elective positions for women since the return of civilian rule.
The situation calls for an honest, methodological interrogation of the nuances behind this current reality.
How can more women get into political spaces and more importantly what does it take to retain the spaces and expand them?
Given Nigeria’s ethnic and geopolitical differentials the responses to these questions are likely to involve a combination of issues with no one-size-fits-all approach. The broad framework of the solutions are, however, likely to revolve around a cocktail of key thematic issues including the role the political party leadership, internal party democracy and the need for women’s economic empowerment. These are the three issues which female aspirants, regardless of what part of Nigeria they come from, can very clearly relate with.
So what would you advise Nigerian women concerning 2023?
Women support your fellow women. It is very, very key.
You also spoke passionately about visibility for women, are you saying women are not visible?
Except you have analysed the number of women who are contesting or maybe at the end of the day those who win, that’s where you can talk about visibility. You know what I mean, I’ve been there before, like I said earlier most people know my name because I’ve been the leader of the house. A lot of people do not know me personally. However, visibility is not about just giving you an opportunity, election is not just about I’m contesting. There are so many things one needs to do to win in that election.
The issue of beevers is something that is giving us a measure of happiness that maybe the issues of rigging will be minimised but there are still a lot of underhand things that go on during the election.
