2023 Elections: Can a Female Gender Change The Narratives?
(A Case Study of Khadijah Okunnu-Lamidi)

KHADIJAH Okunnu-Lamidi declared her interest in contesting for president of Nigeria in the 2023 general election in January 2022.
Speaking at a media conference held in Lagos, she disclosed that her motivation in vying for presidency stems from her desire to make Nigeria work for its diverse populace while also harnessing the undoubted power of its teeming youths.
“I was motivated to contest for presidency because of my desire to rekindle hope and make Nigeria work for all Nigerians” She said.

Background History
Khadija Okunnu-Lamidi, born to the former Federal Works Commissioner, Lateef Olufemi Okunnu is 38 years old and a native of Lagos State. She is married to Adeshola Lamidi and a media personality. She is the only child of her parents but has both maternal and paternal step-siblings. She is popularly known by her friends as ‘KOL Nigeria.’

Educational Background
Khadijah Okunnu-Lamidi attended the University Of Lagos Staff School & Childville School Yaba for her primary education (1986-1994) before proceeding to Atlantic Hall School Maryland for her secondary education (1994-2000).
She holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Management (Hons) from the University of Bolton RAK Campus in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and a Master’s degree in Strategic Project Management (SPM) from the prestigious Heriot-Watt University, Dubai.
She moved back to Lagos to undergo the mandatory NYSC program, where she taught Physics and Chemistry at a Lagos State Government School.

Political Aspiration
Khadija Okunnu-Lamidi has disclosed the 5-pillars she would use to tackle most of the prevailing issues in Nigeria. She highlighted Industrialization, Women Inclusion, Education and Innovation, Governance and Welfare, Law and Security, as her proposed solutions to Nigeria’s problems.

Industrialization
The media professional said she intends to merge all specific projects to create a product that can be easily evaluated in 10 years.
She said, “The way we intend to go about it is to create a vision for what we want the country to look like. There are specific projects, but rather than having them as projects we need to combine them to create products, whereby in 10 years, we want to have this amount of industrialization in this area.
“So we are creating jobs, employment, health services, everywhere you have an industrial path, and powering them with the energy sector. By this, we are also creating and enabling environment for investors, and a safe place for skill acquisition and transfer of knowledge.”

Women Inclusion
According to her, An Okunnu-Lamidi led government will advocate for a 50% inclusion rare for women in politics and governance.
In her words, “As a woman, I cannot but champion these policies for us to have a 50% women inclusion rate”.
She explained that this is what Nigeria needs if leaders must make good decisions. She also noted that women determine the wealth of the nation.
“It is definitely what we need if we are going to make good decisions. Women’s inclusion ensures that policies are able to carry along as many women as possible. There’s a woman in every household. If you do not enable these women, the poorer the women the poorer the nation,” She said.

Education and Innovation
KOL noted that Nigeria’s yet to meet world standards, and if elected, her government would bridge the knowledge and application gap between the nation and the rest of the world through technology.
“Our children here can learn the same things that their counterparts are learning across the world. This also helps us in the application of knowledge. What we do in Nigeria is to only teach, we do not actually teach to apply knowledge, or how to think indifferent scenarios and situations.
“We have put these two hand-in-hand because where we are at the moment is so far behind that we have to use technology to meet the standards of the world.”

Governance and Welfare
Mrs. Okunnu-Lamidi said that the Nigerian government has missed its essence of governance by competing with local businesses.
“We think governance is business that is why governments are competing with businesses but that is wrong”.
She further said her government, if elected, will ensure that the government agencies and parastatals will focus on their functions in order to elevate people living beneath the dignity average of human existence.”

Law and Security
“Without law, there is no order”, Okunnu-Lamidi said. She explained that the state of security in the country can be controlled by law and justice.
“So we put law and security hand-in-hand so that the justice system can work very closely with the security system and we can solve our security issues through legal means.”
Conclusively out of 469 legislative members we only have 14 females and 455 male. What is the problem?