2027: Group Demands 35 Percent Affirmative Action From Mbah

A women’s advocacy group, Loudest Voices for Mbah, has appealed to Gov Peter Mbah of Enugu State to use his good offices to implement the 35 per cent affirmative action in allocating elective positions in the state.

The group further made a case for women to be given opportunities to become senators in the state. They claimed that no woman in the state has become a senator in the current political dispensation.

The leader of the group, Mrs Joy Mammah, made the demands in Enugu. She said women had the capacity to contribute meaningfully to the development of the state and country at large if given a level playing field by their male counterparts. According to her, “there is no way women could make impacts in the polity because they have been systematically schemed out in the decision-making process”.

Mrs Mammah, who is also the Executive Director of Heroine Women Foundation (HWF), charged the governor to support the candidature of women in the forthcoming by-election in the Enugu North senatorial zone as well as during the 2027 general elections to ensure women’s inclusion in elective and decision-making organs in the state.

She claimed that “the political terrain of the state, mainly occupied by men, has deprived women the 35 per cent affirmative action, which prescribed the number of elective positions reserved for women”.

THE WHISTLER reports that the Enugu North senatorial seat became vacant following the death of the senator representing the district, Sen Okey Ezea. Although the campaign for the by-election has not started, our correspondent reports that among the people said to be interested in replacing the deceased senator include Amb Ejike, who contested in 2023; former House of Representative member, Dr Pat Asadu; former Commissioner in the state, Mr Chika Ugwuoke, and the member representing Igboeze South Constituency in the state House of Assembly, Hon Harrison Ogara.