Victor Ogunje in Ado Ekiti
The wife of the fiery human rights activist, Mrs. Funmi Falana, has hinged the increasing spate of violence against men across the country as a product of the frustration of the womenfolk in Nigeria.
Falana said there is no country across the world where women were being muzzled through cultural and societal practices like Nigeria, saying the sordid scenarios, where men were either being killed or wounded by their wives attested to the fact that women are already fighting back in frustration.
She also supported the idea mooted by the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) that education of orphans and children in orphanages should be financed by the governments up to the university level.
Falana spoke in Iyin Ekiti yesterday while donating materials to the Erelu Angela Adebayo Motherless Babies’ Home to mark the Christmas celebration.
Materials donated include baby kits, bags of rice, food items, cash, among other items for the upkeep of the children in the home.
The lawyer said: “On the increasing violence against men, what we are witnessing showed that women have been pushed to the wall.
“Though, there were cases where men were either killed or beaten by their wives, but whatever happens, violence against men was not as rampant as that of the women. Women are now fighting back because of the violence that have been unleashed on them by men.
“From those scenarios, men would have been compelled to learn a lesson and came to understanding that their wives are as important as they are in their marriage. They are not slaves as they think,†she pointed out.
Falana said apart from the constitutional free education up to Junior Secondary School 3 enjoyed by all children across the country, that children in orphanage homes should be allowed to enjoy further benefit up to the university.
On the increasing child labour in the country, Falana said what accounted for the upsurge was lack of the political will to implement all necessary laws that prohibited such nefarious acts in Nigeria.
“We have gender-based prohibition law, Child’s Right Act and equal opportunities law. But all these are not being implemented by our governments.
“Besides, people who are victims of slavery don’t speak out because some of them believed that in African society children don’t have right, they can’t query their parents.
“I want to charge our people to speak out, so that perpetrators of child labour and slavery can be disciplined by way of arrest and prosecution,†she counselled.
