The Maryam Babangida National Center for Women Development has recently had its first wheelchair-accessible ramp installed, 34 years after it was founded.
This was made known by the Director-General of the center, Dr Adedayo Benjamins-Laniyi, on Friday, during the announcement of plans to honour its 34 years anniversary in Abuja.
Benjamins-Laniyi said the center, established by the late First Lady Maryam Babangida, has been operating without access for ladies in wheelchairs until today.
She said the ramp was constructed by Julius Berger at no expense to the government as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility.
The DG said the intervention was necessitated by an accessibility audit undertaken together with the National Commission for Persons with Disabilities.
“When I assumed office on June 1, I refused to sit in the DG’s office upstairs, until women with disabilities can have access to it,” she said.
The decision was based on an event in August when a board member with disabilities, Lois Auta, had to be hoisted by five men to attend a meeting upstairs, she claimed.
For the first time on Wednesday, Auta wheeled inside the building with dignity, without assistance, the DG added.
She said the center will also revamp its auditorium ramp that has caused mishaps owing to incorrect construction.
The center was also mainstreaming disability inclusion beyond physical infrastructure, Benjamins-Laniyi noted.
She stated a visually challenged staff member, who joined the center 29 years ago at the most junior level in the ICT department, would now head a directorate.
She said the center, through its six zonal offices, was improving its enabling technology and putting out new empowerment packages, research, artificial intelligence and ICT programs.
Its partners included the High Commission of India and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), she said.
The DG said the center was working with the National Gallery of Art to launch “First 66”, a public portal to enable Nigerians to select 65 living women icons.
“Oluremi Tinubu, the First Lady, who recently celebrated her 66th birthday, would be number one on the portal, she said.
Benjamins-Laniyi called for women to be more solidarity and created a charge “She for She” to counter the idea that women do not support women.
She urged women who stood for the elections to be focused, adding that contesting for a position was a step toward situating other women.
According to her, the center was being repositioned as the front office of the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs in keeping with the Women O’Clock proclamation of the Minister, Imaan Sulaiman-Ibrahim. (NAN)
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