‘Why Govt Should Focus More On Women, Art, Craft’

The Nigerian government has been called upon to focus more on women, art, craft and the creative industry to grow the economy.

The National Coordinator of New Dawn for Women and Community Intervention Initiative (NEWOMCII), Hajia Saadatu Adamu Bokane, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) dedicated to empowering women, youth, and vulnerable communities, said the country’s economy can grow with a focus on these areas.

Hajia Bokane, accompanied by the National Secretary, Mrs Change Osuji, speaking to journalists, ahead of the organisation’s National Launch and Book Unveiling, slated for Tuesday, 28 April, the National Coordinator said NEWOMCII saw a gap that women have the potential but lack the opportunity, access to resources and information to actualise their potentials.

According to her, the NGO was registered eight months ago and swung into action in August 2025, adding that it was conceived by Alhaji Bolaji Raji, the NGO’s founder and Chairman.

He said their founder has been involved in charity work before and has privately supported Nigerians. Still, he felt he should expand the organisation by forming an NGO, which led to its establishment.

Hajia Bokane said, “He is someone who grew up among aunties, so he acknowledges the role of women in society. He felt the NGO should be women-oriented because women are results-oriented.

“The NGO has two thematic areas, Agriculture and art and creativity. We felt that the art and culture sector had been neglected over the years. The contributions of women in art, craft and the creative industry have been so silent for so many years.

“Nigeria as a nation is supposed to diversify into art, craft and creativity. There are a lot of funds lying idle at UNESCO, and Nigeria is one of the countries contributing to it, yet we don’t even know what we are supposed to tap into.

“If we go into the rural areas, even before the emergence of white-collar jobs, people are training their children and running their daily lives with their indigenous arts and crafts.

“Women are contributing immensely in that area, and most of these women are in rural areas. They don’t even know how to access facilities, yet they contribute silently to the economy.

“So, we felt we should reach out to these categories of people in our society. If you go deep, back into history, women are the ones who discovered agriculture.

“In the two areas of our focus, we have touched on about five areas of councils in the FCT. We started with FCT because we believed it is the heartbeat of the nation, so one of our pilot projects kick-started in the FCT. In the agricultural sector, we visited a village in the Bwari Area Council, where we met women engaged in rice and corn farming.

“They were 45 in number, out of which 20 were widows. We interviewed them, and they said that since they started, there has been no government intervention, and no NGO has ever come to their aid.

“The only NGO that came only took them to their farms, snapped pictures with them and never came back again. We were the first to reach out to them, and within 10 days, we supplied them with what they needed. They complained about the farm implements used to harvest their produce. After providing them with the tools they needed, they were happy and said they’d never witnessed such a gesture before.

“We have a monitoring and evaluation team, who visited them the second time to ensure that what we supplied to them, they are making good use of it”.

She said the organisation also visited a community in Karu, where women were empowered with modern facilities to ease their work in art and craft.

NEWOMCII has been in operation for less than 1 year, has a presence across Nigeria (all 36 states and Abuja), and has impactful success stories.

The organisation focuses on skills development, economic empowerment, and community-based interventions.