Femi Mustapha
A Non Governmental Organisation (NGO), Widows Multipurpose Development Association (WIMDA), has trained 25 widows and provide them with empowerment items in Kaduna.
The Widows were also supported by sewing machine, refrigerators, knitting machines, dryers, ovens, among other equipments to kick start the trade they were trained in respectively.
As part of efforts by the organization to make the widows self reliant, tableware trained in knitting, tailoring, cooking, cosmetics, baskets, bead work, tie and die, shoe making, among others.
At the graduation ceremony of the widows, the Founder of WIMDA, Dame Patricia Danmaida, said the reason for training and empowering the widows was to give them a sense of belonging and make them happy in. View of the acute lack of job opportunities.
She also said, the poor economy, which poses hardship, especially to widows who sometimes have nothing or little to cater for their children. “Widows go through a lot of inhuman acts in our contemporary societies, if they are lucky sometimes, they are asked to remain with the late husband’s family, if not, they are sent packing,” she said.
Danmaida noted that the training was thus to empower the widows towards self-reliance, personal income generating activities to enable them fend for themselves and their children and meet up the challenges posed by the dwindling economy, while urging them to make judicious use of the equipments given to them in achieving the set objectives of the NGO.
Also, the representative of a donor, Mainstream Foundation, the corporate social responsibility outfit of Mainstream Energy Solutions Limited, the operators of Kainji and Jebba Hydro Power Plants, Mr Omeiza Okumoh, said the widows are a great part of the society who needed assistance to move on with life.
He noted that the Mainstream Foundation work to improve quality of lives of communities around the Kainji and Jebba lakes and Niger basin, but due to the kind of beneficiaries involved (Widows), they deemed it fit to extend their humanitarian gesture for the first time in Kaduna.
“We have done almost 500 projects in our catchment areas and we are doing more, women empowerment in one of our key areas and we are glad to be in Kaduna to partner and make donations,” he said
Responding on behalf of the widows, Rodah Duniya, commended WIMDA for the humanitarian gesture and urged other well-meaning Nigerians and bodies to emulate the association, especially in assisting widows and other less privileged people in the society.
