When the news broke that Abdulmalik Sarkin Daji, the speaker of the Niger State House of Assembly, had made arrangements for the marriage of 100 girls from his constituency, most of whom are reportedly orphans, social media was ablaze with opprobrium for him. In her reaction, the honorable minister for women affairs, Barrister Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, promptly picked up issues with the proposed marital arrangement as a violation of the Child Rights Act and straightaway went to court to secure an ex parte injunction, restraining the speaker from going ahead with the plan. She even petitioned the IGP. However, after heavy criticism from religious leaders and other stakeholders in the state and elsewhere in the region, the minister caved in to them, withdrew her lawsuit against the lawmaker, and gave her blessings for the marriage to go ahead as planned—she even sent a delegate with gifts for the girls, including scholarships up to university level for any of them who may be interested in going to school, which is a fat chance.
The backtracking of the honorable minister might seem understandable, considering the sexist ridicule she endured from some vile chauvinists for doing her job. Notwithstanding the baseless accusations and contempt hurled at her, for how long are we going to continue pandering to absurdity? For how long are we going to sacrifice common sense on the inglorious altar of political correctness? The allegations levied against Mrs. Kennedy-Ohanenye as an outlier to the mores of the north are ludicrous. To a reasonable person, what sense is there in marrying off girls who are literally destitute of education and/or skill? When the guardians of these girls approached the “kindhearted” speaker to assist them with the resources to perform their marital rites, why did he not suggest some form of empowerment for them first? God forbid, if some severely debilitating disaster befalls their spouses, how will they support themselves and their families economically? In that case, whose responsibility will they be? I’m aware the speaker is a polygamist with several children. Would he give any of his female child(ren) in marriage without them having the basic education and/or skill to be self-sufficient adults? It’s a good guess that he wouldn’t; if so, how did he then connect it together that sponsoring the marriages of other people’s uneducated and unskilled children is “alleviating” their suffering?
Before his election as speaker of the Niger HOA, Sarkin-Daji was a two-term LGA chairman and commissioner. Probably due to the shrinking pool of educated people in the north, the rate at which politicians are recycled in this region is the highest in the country. This is inadvertently (or maybe intentionally) creating a kind of caste system where the ruling elites have sequestered almost all the political and economic opportunities of the region for themselves and their relations.
Though banditry and terrorism are now commonly blamed for the various socioeconomic misfortunes befalling the north, the failure of politicians in the region to put their feet down and demand that members of their constituents get useful education is a huge disservice to the common people in the north. For example, according to the National Mass Education Initiative, Niger State has 42.8 percent of out-of-school children in the country and is among the worst 10 states in this category. Given this negative statistic from his state, coupled with the fact that he is even a learned man, it is beyond sad that it never occurred to him that the best way to alleviate the suffering of indigent girls in his constituency is by providing a useful empowerment scheme for them, not marrying them out to gratify the sexual cravings of men! The speaker should be ashamed of himself.
JenisiWORLD Media 
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