Sola Ojo, Kaduna
Ahead of the forthcoming national election of the Nigeria Association of Women Journalists (NAWOJ) expected to take place during the association’s national convention in Minna, Niger State this November, a presidential candidate, Lucy Danjuma Chindaba, at the weekend wooed convention delegates to consider her candidature.
Lucy, an erstwhile national scribe believed that the time has come for NAWOJ to move from it’s present state to where it ought to be, leveraging on her previous leadership prowess and exposure both locally and internationally to make that happen.
For example, Lucy is considering competitive society a must for the women journalists in Nigeria, an opportunity she believes would give them leverage to earn residual income outside journalism to enable them to perform their role more effectively in the nation-building.
Lucy and are teeming supporters had travelled from Jos, Plateau State to solicit the support of colleagues in Kaduna State ahead of the convention in Minna.
She said, “we are here to solicit your support as we all know that a tree does not make a forest. We need people to lead. We need your support to lead in Minna during the convention.
“We are 31 years now without a secretariat for NOWOJ. We need a secretariat we can call NAWOJ secretariat. We need to speak up as women and as mothers. We need training and retraining.
“We are in the World of technology and some of us are yet to be able to flow with the wave the way we should. So, we will create that opportunity to get relevant skills so we can flow with World technologically.
“In the last six years, we have been able to hold NEC meeting just twice which contradict constitutional provision. With your support, we can be holding an NEC meeting every three months.
“We will also come up with social activities so we can have a social programme where we can unwind after the enormous task of journalism and family. We also need to embark on exchange programmes to sharpen up ourselves.
“Let us ensure NAWOJ is not where we are now. We need to step up our game. We will operate an open-door policy because we know nobody is useless.
*We will also look into having a functional cooperative which will help us to earn outside journalism. This will enable us to have a financial discipline and help the widows among us”, she promised.
Lucy and her team were hosted in Kaduna by Vice President (Northwest) Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Yusuf Idris, Chairman of the Union in Kaduna, Yusuf Adamu, former Chairperson of NAWOJ in Kaduna, Jummai Yari, current NAWOJ Chairperson, Fatima Aliyu among others.