UNICAL: Womanifesto Activists Write Minister, Demand Apology over Statement

The Minister of Women Affairs, Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, has been urged by a coalition of more than 500 women’s rights organizations operating under the auspices of Womanifesto to publicly apologize for allegedly working against the interests of women in Nigeria.

The group was responding to the minister’s alleged statement regarding the University of Calabar sexual harassment scandal.

The group expressed its grave concern over her comments regarding the UNICAL sexual harassment case and their implications for the interests and protection of vulnerable women and children in Nigeria.

The minister appeared to imply in the video that the students were being used and controlled by certain individuals in order to remove Ndifon from office so they could take his place.

The minister claimed in the video that because the female students admitted they had not been sexually assaulted, they had not been raped.

But Womanifesto recalled a recent meeting with the minister where she was cautioned to desist from interfering in the case of sexual harassment against Ndifon and interacting with the female student victims in the case, with the potential motive/outcome of silencing them, in a letter to Ohaneye dated September 15, 2023, that was obtained by journalists in Abuja on Saturday.

President Bola Tinubu, chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other-Related Offenses Commission, Prof. The letter, which was signed by Dr. Abiola Akiyode-Afolabi, co-convener of the Womenifesto and executive director of the Women Advocates Research and Documentation Center, was also copied to Dr. Bolaji Owasanoye, Tony Ojukwu (SAN), executive secretary of the National Human Rights Commission, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), attorney general of the Federation and minister of justice, and first lady Senator Oluremi Tinubu.