Nigerian Minister of Communication Technology, Dr. Omobola Johnson is calling for deliberate integration of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and Information & Communication Technology in the global drive to achieve gender neutrality.
Dr. Johnson, in her speech at a Tedx Event in Geneva, Switzerland, noted that while her home country, Nigeria, has achieved creditable success in girl’s enrolment among other KPIs of gender equality, the situation on ground cannot be reconciled with these indices.
This according to her is as a result of age-hold cultural prejudices. She said, “I have had cause to wonder whether achievement of the KPIs are not clouding our vision, because despite the achievement of these KPIs, women are still being murdered and raped for exercising their choices… We are not really addressing the underlying root cause of this problem, and these are age-old deeply ingrained cultural mind-sets.”
She averred that real advancement in gender equality will not come about until we begin to redefine what we term as success (KPIs, which are currently stagnant and restrictive), to measure both form and substance of progress in women’s empowerment and gender equality, while integrating Information and Communication Technology to redress age-old prejudices about women and girls.
Watch the video below.
