allAfrica.com: Nigeria: Hidden Agenda Against Women (Page 1 of 1)

In the Vanguard Newspaper of 1 July 2008 (posted to the web), honourable Saadatu Sani, chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) said that there was need to find an alternative name for abortion since the word "abortion" makes people, including parliamentarians, uncomfortable.

Hon. Sani made this remark at a dinner recently organized for members of the National Assembly by Ipas, an international abortion-lobby organization which has been lobbying for the legalization of abortion in Nigeria. At the dinner, Hon. Sani called on Ipas and other abortion organizations to look for an alternative word to replace the word "abortion" in Nigeria since the word is offensive to many people.

What Sani is saying, in straight-forward language, is that since the word "abortion" is repugnant in the Nigerian socio-cultural and political setting because it is understood as the killing of babies, Ipas and other abortionists should employ suitable euphemisms, skilful semantics and dodgy words in marketing abortion in Nigeria so that the unwary public would buy it without knowing what they are buying.

You can see the hidden agenda against Nigerian women. Ipas spearheaded the legalization of abortion in South Africa under the euphemism: Choice on Termination of Pregnancy (CTOP). Owing to mounting public opposition to the Abortion Bill in South Africa , Ipas got the South African parliament to re-name the Bill: "Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Bill". Aside from this dodgy phrase, the following are other dodgy words used by abortionists to hide abortion: Instead of "abortion" they use the phrase "termination of pregnancy", "pro-choice" rather than "pro-abortion", "anti-choice" rather than "pro-life".

These are some of the alternative words Hon. Sani is asking Ipas to shop for. At any rate, abortionists in Nigeria are already using these dodgy words in promoting abortion in Nigeria . Under euphemisms like "Women's Reproductive Right", "Family Planning", "Adolescent sexual Reproductive Right", "Safe Motherhood" etc the Federal Ministry of Health, Ministry of Women Affairs, United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), Ipas, United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), Women aids Collective (WACOL), Society for Gynecology and Obstetrics of Nigeria (SOGON) and others which have been aggressively lobbying for the legalization of abortion in Nigeria.

In Anambra State , for instance, abortion has been legalized, in fragrant violation of the Criminal Code, under the deceptive euphemistic expression: 'Women's Reproductive Right". This is one bitter pill many Anambra citizens cannot swallow. But it is true: abortion is now legal in Anambra State . The law came into force on 17th March, 2005 when Professor Brian Adinma was the commissioner for Health, Anambra State . Section 6 (a) of the law states that "the view of the woman shall be taken into consideration for decisions: on the number, timing and spacing of the children " Prima facie, this phrase may sound laudable. But section 6 (a) is substantially similar to article 16(e) of the controversial Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). This section, which was first articulated as an abortion right at the International Conference on Human Rights in Teheran, has consistently been interpreted in all countries and places as giving women right to abortion throughout all the nine months of pregnancy, with or without the consent of their husbands. To fully understand the meaning of section 6(a) of the Anambra abortion law, one must read the publications of the Center for reproductive Law and policy, 120 Wall Street , New York , United States where the Anambra law was borrowed from. Section 6 (a) has been interpretation in the said publication to mean: "abortion is a woman's choice", 'women are entitled to have access to all safe, effective means of controlling their family size, including abortion", "A woman has a right to make decisions regarding her own body", Denying women access to abortion is a form of gender discrimination, "Safe abortion services protect women's right to health"

In 2006, SOGON executives co-sponsored an Abortion Bill at the National Assembly through Senator Daisy Ehanire- Danjuma under the euphemism: "National Reproductive Health Bill". The lawyers who contested the Bill at the National Assembly had a hard time trying to convince the National Assembly that even though the word: abortion was never mentioned anywhere in the Bill, it was nevertheless an Abortion Bill from head to toe. After much public debate, the National Assembly Health Committee dismissed the Bill for lack of merit. Undaunted by the dismissal, the abortionists re-grouped in the last days of the Obasanjo government and started mounting pressures on some members of the National Assembly to domesticate the controversial CEDAW. Those efforts also failed.

The pertinent question to ask, in the light of the above startling revelations is: why this conspiracy against Nigerian women? The answer to this question is very important considering that, under the cover of "gender equality", "discrimination against women", "women's reproductive rights", many money-making radical feminists and women liberators are going about deceiving women and telling them that what they need for their empowerment is abortion. Ipas is going about freely distributing "Mama-Kit", Manual Vacuum Aspirators (MVA) and other abortion instruments to unsuspecting Nigerian women. Concern over maternal mortality, including deaths following abortion, is being used by international pro-abortion agencies as a ruse to expand access to abortion in Nigeria . For example, Ipas tells the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, US House of Representatives, that Nigerian women are dying in droves because they are denied access to abortion clinics. A tremendous fallacy lurks behind this argument. Denial of access to abortion or reproductive right is not the cause of high maternal mortality in Nigeria . There is no cause-effect relationship between increase in maternal mortality and procurement of abortion. In other words, it is not because abortion is illegal in Nigeria that we are experiencing increase in maternal mortality. The main causes of high maternal mortality in Nigeria are genteel poverty, poor nutrition, and lack of access to effective and affordable health care and emergency obstetric care. Legalization of abortion will not cure increasing maternal deaths. For example, Great Britain and United States had since legalized abortion, yet they are still experiencing high maternal mortality rate. Ireland where abortion is illegal has one of the lowest maternal deaths in the world.

For survival, Nigerian women do not need abortion or so-called reproductive right. They need real social, economic and political empowerment-access to food, political power, effective and affordable health care and emergency obstetric care. Most important, abortion is the greatest violence against women. Women who had done abortion are susceptible to cancer and long-lasting psychological trauma. Abortion is discriminatory against women. Pro-abortion male doctors are enriching their pockets advising hapless pregnant young students to go for abortion.

Unfortunately many United Nations Agencies working in Nigeria have managed to sideline these real needs of Nigerian women in favour of Western ideological agenda for abortion and population control. The African soil is a dumping ground for all sorts of Western ideological baggage. They are now telling us that HIV/AIDS is an African disease. They want us to reduce our population by force. They discourage married African women from having children. Through CEDAW, they want to liberate African women from their homes in the same way Western women are liberated from their homes. They are teaching our children "safe-sex" with condom. In the name of sex education they teach secondary school pupil how to practice masturbation for pleasure.

Therefore Nigerian women must stand up and be counted. Let those concerned mothers get up and speak up. They cannot allow a few badly-nurtured radical feminists on the pay roll of the United Nations Agencies to be speaking for them and taking decisions on their behalf. With failed leadership, the family remains the only safety-net in Africa . Destruction of African families ultimately amounts to the destruction of Africa .

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