Recently the BBC Pidgin service interviewed Oghenekaro Omu, the 26 year old behind the Nigerian non-profit, Sanitary Aid for Nigerian girls. Omu began the non-profit in late 2016 after a conversation on impressed on her just how stacked against the average the Nigerian girl, basic sanitary hygiene is. So Omu did something about it, she founded an NGO and crowd sourced funding for the project herself. S.A.N.G. has grown into a crowd sourced phenomenon, providing sanitary aid for several thousand girls since its inception.
While the work of Karo Omu and Sanitary Aid for Nigerian Girls is commendable, it is only a drop in a massive ocean. Nigeria has an estimated 100 million women, many of whom live below the poverty line and struggle to provide even the most basic amenities. NGO’s cannot provide the kind of change we need. We must lend our voices and pressure government into providing policies that either subsidized sanitary aid for all women or provide sanitary aid for teenage girls. Anything else would simply be a temporary salve on an enduring problem. Nigeria has had problem acknowledging the unique challenges women experience and this is one of the ways we can come through for them.
Please lend your voice to this cause.
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