Traditional rulers from South West region at a recent forum with female civil society groups in Abuja charge National Assembly to swiftly pass the Special Seats Bill to boost women’s representation. Sunday Aborisade reports.
Last Friday in Abuja, Nigeria witnessed a political moment unusual not only for its scale, but for the symbolic weight behind it. More than 100 traditional rulers from the six states of the South-West geo-political zone, who are custodians of centuries of Yoruba history and social authority, sat shoulder to shoulder with women’s rights coalitions, civic groups, and policy experts.
The monarchs, who were led by the Ooni of Ife, His Imperial Majesty, Oba Enitan Adeyeye Ogunwunsi Ojaja Il, include Oba Joseph Moronfoye OkuntolaOni, Onigbaye of Igbaye Osun State; Oba Adekunle Adeagbo, Oore of Otun Ekiti, Ekiti State; Oba Dr Sunday Aikuirawo Aniyi Obaleo of Erinmope Ekiti, Ekiti State; Oba Dr Aladetoyinbo Ogunlade Aladelusi, Deji of Akure, Ondo State; Oba Gbadegesin Ogunoye, Olowo of Owo, Ondo State; Oba Dr Olufolarin Olukayode Ogunsanwo, Alara of llara Epe, Lagos State;
Oba Dr Adeoriyomi Oyebo, Obateru of Egbin, Lagos State; Oba Olawale Oyebola Adeyeri Asipa, Aseyin Aseyin, Oyo State; Oba Sunday Oyediran, Onipetu Ogbomosho, Oyo State;
Oba Sulaiman Adekunle Bamgbade Ayodele Ill, Olofin of Isheri;Ogun State; Oba Benjamin Olanite, Onimeko Imeko, Ogun State; Oba Joseph Adewole, Ajero of Ijero Ekiti, Ekiti State and Oba Jacob Adetayo Hastrup, Lumobi Imobi, Osun State.
Their mission was clear: to push, with unprecedented unity, for the National Assembly to pass the Special Seats Bill for Women, the most ambitious constitutional effort so far to correct Nigeria’s entrenched gender imbalance in elected governance.
The gathering, facilitated by the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS), was neither ceremonial nor perfunctory. It was agenda-driven, strategically timed, and politically deliberate. With the National Assembly already warming up constitutional amendments for the 10th Assembly, advocates believe this moment may be the closest the country has come to enshrining guaranteed legislative representation for women.
But what electrified the room, and what has since reframed national conversations, was the dramatic entry of the South-West traditional institution into what has long been a battle led mainly by women’s advocacy groups.
Seated at the centre of the hall, robed in white and gold, was His Imperial Majesty, the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, leading the royal delegation and serving as the face of a new moral and cultural front for the Bill.
And from the moment he began to speak, it became clear that the politics of the Special Seats Bill may never be the same again.
The Ooni did not mince words. He did not hedge. He did not speak like a neutral observer. Instead, he delivered a passionate, almost prophetic appeal, partly sermon, partly political argument, and partly cultural rebuke.
The monarch said, “We treat women like caterpillars that clear the road. They prepare the road, they nurture us, they build the platform. And when it is time to move forward, we tell them they cannot pass on the same road they built.”
For a room filled with female intelligentsia and political strategists, the message was unmistakable: this was an intervention from the heart of Yoruba traditional authority, insisting that the exclusion of women from political decision-making has become a cultural injustice, not just a constitutional flaw.
According to the Ooni, the Bill, which proposes six additional Senate seats per geo-political zone, 37 in the House of Representatives, and 108 across state assemblies, is “the minimum acceptable corrective step.”
He said, “We must give women more inclusion, more participation in anything we do. They produce, nurture and multiply everything we give them, yet we treat them as afterthoughts. It is not fair.”
The monarch then issued what may become one of the most consequential political pledges of the year: South-West monarchs, he said, would mobilise their subjects, including political leaders, community stakeholders, and, critically, their children and protégés now serving in elected positions.
Ooni said, “We understand how to speak to our subjects. We are not using force, but appealing with wisdom. And we are fully supporting this Bill.”
He also extended praise to the First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, calling her “mother of the nation” whose long years in advocacy for the girl child had paved the way for the moment.
If the traditional rulers gave the day its soul, NILDS provided its political and intellectual backbone.
In his agenda-setting address, NILDS Director-General, Prof. Abubakar Sulaiman made a clear and data-driven case for affirmative action, warning that Nigeria’s current level of women’s representation, which is less than 5% nationally, is not only indefensible but “a structural failure that decades of elections have failed to correct.”
This, he argued, is what makes the Special Seats Bill not just desirable but inevitable.
“Across Africa, affirmative action has transformed political systems,” he said, citing examples: Rwanda, with over 60% women in parliament. Tanzania, where “special seats” increased women’s legislative presence to 37%. Uganda, whose district woman-representative system has produced a pipeline of female political leadership.
Senegal, where a parity law now ensures that women occupy over 40% of parliamentary seats.
Sulaiman further said, “These are not theories. They are African models that have enhanced the quality of governance. When women are at the table, policy outcomes improve in education, healthcare, social welfare and human security.”
NILDS, he explained, convened the meeting because legislative reform must align with both institutional design and cultural legitimacy.
“Traditional leadership has moral authority. Political leadership carries constitutional authority. Today, both have come together. It was a carefully constructed coalition,and one that may prove decisive.”
While monarchs and NILDS provided strategy and symbolism, civil society brought urgency and painful statistics.
Former ActionAid Country Director and member of the 100 Women Lobby Group, Ene Obi, delivered what became the most sobering intervention of the day.
She began by pointing to the stark gender deficit in Nigeria’s legislative bodies: Only four women in the 109-member Senate.
Only 16 women in the 360-member House of Representatives.
14 state assemblies with zero women in their chambers.
“What does this mean?” Obi asked. “It means committees on women affairs in 14 states are chaired by men, dominated by men, and deliberated by men. And those who wear the shoes are absent from the table.”
She then turned to the human cost of exclusion saying “Nigeria is among the bottom five countries globally in maternal mortality. Every pregnant woman is on a death row. Policies will not improve until women are part of drafting them.”
Obi recalled the painful memory of March, 2022 when five gender bills, including an earlier version of the Special Seats Bill, were rejected, triggering weeks of protest by women who blocked the gates of the National Assembly.
She said, “We burnt in the Abuja sun for four legislative weeks,” she said. “Yet they did not hear us. But the 10th Assembly promised not to throw gender bills away again.”
Still, she pushed further, urging lawmakers to consider raising the proposed Senate seats for women from six to eight.
On the proportional representation matters, Obi insisted that “the Constitution must reflect the reality that women are half of our population.”
The significance of Friday’s meeting lay not only in the speeches delivered, but in the coalition it silently forged.
The event brought into one room:
Over 100 Southwest traditional rulers, NILDS leadership, UN Women and development partners, Leading women’s coalitions and CSOs and Policy experts and constitutional advocates.
At the end of the meeting, stakeholders agreed to build a South-West Advocacy Bloc, a structured, ongoing coalition anchored on: Traditional rulers as mobilisers of cultural legitimacy;
Legislators as custodians of the constitutional amendment process;
Women’s groups as policy advocates and public educators and NILDS as the technical and research nerve centre.
The goal is singular: secure the passage of the Special Seats Bill within the lifespan of the 10th National Assembly.
The South-West’s renewed involvement is not symbolic, it is strategic. Politically, the zone commands significant representation in both chambers of the National Assembly. Culturally, Yoruba monarchs wield deep influence on public sentiment.
Historically, the region produced some of Nigeria’s earliest female political pioneers, from Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti to contemporary female legislators, commissioners and deputy governors.
As Ene Obi noted, the region “almost produced Nigeria’s first female governor.”
And with a First Lady from the South-West now occupying Aso Rock, advocates believe momentum is building.
The Ooni himself reminded the room that young girls constitute the bulk of top academic performers in universities where many monarchs serve as Chancellors.
“Eighty percent of first-class students are young women,” he said. “Where will we place them if we don’t create space now?”
Friday’s gathering created a rare fusion of Nigeria’s traditional, civic and legislative power centres.
From the Ooni’s moral authority to NILDS’ institutional strategy, from the testimonies of women like Ene Obi to the commitments expressed by other monarchs present, the event suggested that gender inclusion, long treated as a peripheral issue, is entering the mainstream of national politics.
With constitutional amendments on the horizon, the Special Seats Bill may face a defining test in the months ahead.
But advocates believe the winds have shifted.
As Prof. Sulaiman puts it, “Affirmative action is not a favour to women. It is an investment in Nigeria’s democracy.”
And as the Ooni concluded in what became the emotional crescendo of the day:
“Women rule this world. We men are only deceiving ourselves. Once they enter the National Assembly, they will take over and it will be a good takeover. So let us give them the chance now.”
For the first time in years, gender inclusion in politics feels less like a demand and more like an inevitability.
The question now is whether the National Assembly will seize this moment, or let it slip by again.
