From Fred Itua, Abuja
The Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) has urged members of the National Assembly to aft fast on all women-friendly bills before them.
Hammering on its firm resolve to end all forms of Gender-Based Violence within their powers, the CUPP also charged the lawmakers to further enlarge the space for public participation of women in the economic and socio-political aspects of the nation’s daily life.
Addressing newsmen in Abuja on Tuesday, the spokesman of CUPP, Ikenga Imo Ugochukwu expressed sadness over the decision of the All Progressives Congress (APC) led National Assembly leadership to slap women few days to international women day celebrations by rejecting bills that would have opened the political space for more women participation.
He spoke as part of activities to mark this year’s International Women’s Day.
Ugochukwu said that the leader of the opposition family, Iyorcha Ayu is pained by “this parliamentary decision and have since commenced action towards mobilising our lawmakers on how best to deal with the challenges posed by the rejection of the bill.”
He said that International Women’s Day ‘is another opportunity to reflect on how far we have come as a people in giving our women the pride of place in our society, in conformity with relevant best practices.
‘It is an occasion to reaffirm our support for implementable affirmative actions for our women and to further re-emphasise our firm resolve to end all forms of Gender-Based Violence within our powers.
‘We, therefore, join all men of goodwill across the world to celebrate our immensely resourceful and industrious women, while calling on all parliaments to favourably expedite work on all women-friendly bills before them, to further enlarge the space for public participation of our women in the economic and socio-political aspects of our daily life.’
He, however, said that the opposition is also working hard to create more participation platforms for women internationally.