The low number of women in Nigeria’s security agencies including the Nigeria Police Force, and NPF has been attributed to the fact that many women are not educated.
This was the view of a programme specialist, Peter Mancha while delivering a lecture on the 3rd Day of the Conference and Retreat for Senior Police Officers in Owerri, Imo State 2023.
His lecture was titled “Developing a Gender Responsive Strategy and Implementation Mechanism in the Nigeria Police Force.”
Mancha disclosed that the percentage of women in the security sector globally is 18%, which is low.
He said Nigeria with a population of 200 million people, 50 percent of the population are women, lamenting however, that there is a huge gender gap in security sectors including the Nigeria police force in the country.
He further said gender inequality is widespread in the country due to patriarchy in the society.
He noted that although, the NPF is trying to bridge the gender gap, but it’s not enough.
He also stressed the need to discard discrimatory practices against women.
Mancha said gender is important to police reforms because the NPF is a gendered institution that needs to engender its internal operations and management.
Another reason he gave for why gender is important in police reforms is because the NPF works with a gendered society and communities.
According to him, international, regional and national policy environment is committed to principles of gender equality, women empowerment and social inclusion.
