The fight to impose abortion on Africa countries hasn’t been easy on the Western world but it seems they are very much resilient in their fight. In the same vein, many legislators of African countries are also resilient; it has now become the battle of the strongest, in the past months we saw some African countries showing off their strength.
Last month, through a bill called Gender and Equal Opportunities Bill, another attempt was made to introduce abortion in Nigeria, the bill has many laudable sections which if passed will do lots of good to better the socio, economic and political conditions of women. As expected, this nice bill was padded with some sections which provide for abortion and for the incorporation of the provisions of the protocol to the African charter on Human and people’s rights on the rights of women (MAPUTO Protocol) and the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). These international instruments, have provisions which will further the culture of death all in the name of advancing women’s right, if incorporated into our local laws.
Luckily our legislators saw these section and halted the passage of this bill, this action was described by many women activists as male chauvinism and a failure of Nigeria to protects it women. Despite the lashes, the Nigerian Legislature was resilient and asked the sponsor of the Bill – Mrs Biodun Olujimi- to review the bill and expunge the erroneous sections before it will be passed.
In a similar vein, Sierra Leone’s President Ernest Bai Koroma refused to sign a bill legalising abortion in Sierra Leone, saying that it should be put to a referendum. He has been under pressure from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International to sign the bill on the guise that through it maternal mortality rate (MMR) will decrease. But the leaders of the Inter Religious Council of Sierra Leone (IRCSL) have replied that if they are interested in the women’s right, they should help provide medical facilities which are the only solution to reducing maternal mortality.
Although a few African counties have given in, we hope that the others keep their lamps still burning brightly.
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