By Stanley Onyekwere
The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Malam Muhammad Musa Bello has vowed to continue to give girls and women fair treatment in scheme of things in the Territory.
Bello gave this assurance Tuesday, at the Northern traditional and religious leaders summit on ending gender based violence tagged ‘moving from awareness to taking action’ held in Abuja.
He noted that the FCT Administration have long placed a premium on the empowerment of women and girls through its girl child education policy that encourages the education of the female child.
The Minister explained that through the initiative, a number of the girls have grown up to become professionals in their own right.
He said, “In FCT, we have long placed a premium on the empowerment of women and girls through our girl child education policy which encourages the education of the female child with the award of scholarship to indigent girls in danger of dropping out.
“We also have quite a number of women enrolled in our adult and mass education programmes across the FCT and many of them have graduated to becoming successful small scale entrepreneurs”.
Earlier in his opening remarks, the Sultan of Sokoto and president General of the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA), Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar asked the strategic stakeholders to step up ways to address cases of gender based violence in the Northern region.
He acknowledged that with the influence of the leaders and other strategic stakeholders, issues of some persons abusing girls and women for just no cause will be addressed.
His Eminence said the programme was convened by Sultan Foundation for Peace and Development to identify additional ways through which the messages against human abuses especially girls and women would be properly past.
