TheCable

Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire, senior special assistant to the president on sustainable development goals (SDGs), says all hands must be on deck to end poverty among women.

In a statement on Sunday to mark the 2021 International Women’s Day, Orelope-Adefulire said COVID-19 has made many women poorer.

She said just like in the other parts of the world, the pandemic has worsened gender inequalities in Nigeria, especially among the poor, with many women finding it difficult to cater for their families as a result of the loss of their livelihoods.

Orelope-Adefulire, however, noted that the federal government has taken steps to ameliorate the situation by setting up the Special Cash Grant Project through which 135,000 rural women across the 36 states of the country and the federal capital territory (FCT) are currently benefitting from “one-off” grant of N20,000 each.

According to her, the president had at the inception of COVID-19 in Nigeria directed the expansion of the Social Safety Net Register to accommodate more beneficiaries of the government’s cash transfer programme while women are also major beneficiaries of the various initiatives under the N2.3 trillion economic stimulus plan of the administration.

“This means all hands must be on deck to end the poverty among women as parts of efforts to ensure no one is left behind through sustainable initiatives targeted at job creation and expansion of economic activities across the country,” Orelope-Adefulire was quoted to have said.

She asked other stakeholders to join the efforts in ensuring that more women are brought into the mainstream of social-economic activities in Nigeria.