Protection of Women Against Discriminatory Laws, Policies and Practices in Nigeria: an Appraisal

Human rights are rights that have come to be guaranteed over time, to all men and women, irrespective of race or creed. These rights extend to even the unborn, in certain circumstances. However, in many societies, women are subject to discriminatory tendencies in the form of laws, policies and practices that derogate from their human rights, simply became of their gender. Many international instruments have been put in place to stem these negative tendencies, especially through the works of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the International Labour Organization (I.L.O) In Nigeria, for instance, women tend to suffer inequalities in the social, political , economic and cultural fields. This is notwithstanding the fact that there are formal provisions on the statute books that guarantees equality to all before the law. As the ‘grundnorm,’ all the Constitution made for Nigeria with their fundamental rights provisions envisage equality of all citizens, whether male or female. The Thesis finds that the envisaged equality is at best formal and not actual, even though the country is a party to international conventions and instruments that provide for equal enjoyment of human rights by both genders. Some laws, cultural practices and traditions have been fingered in restricting and derogating from the enjoyment of basic rights by women. This thesis sets out to identify derogations from women’s rights, its effects and proffer suggestions on how to curtail these gustative tendencies, with particular reference to Nigeria.

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND TO STUDY

Women are connected to other human beings through the biologically based activities of pregnancy, breast-feeding and heterosexual intercourse¹. However, throughout history, women have had to struggle against direct and indirect barriers to their self-development and their full participation in social, political, economic and cultural activities of different societies. Discrimination against women starts at birth, in the discriminatory