To empower, equip and embolden underprivileged women and girls in seven rural communities in Borno State, the Gender Equality, Peace and Development Centre, GEPaDC, a CSO Partner on the ACT Programme has employed leadership skills to bridge the cultural and religious barriers, among others for these women to realise their raw and untapped potential. Rebecca Ejifoma narrates the account of three women who realised their potentials and are now contributing their quota to society.
Hajara (last name withheld) from Borno State didn’t know she could be more than a sex slave. Neither did she know that life as a girl wasn’t all about being trafficked. All she could think of was that her yoke was nothing close to easy, and her burden was anything but light. From being trafficked, and sexually exploited as an adolescent to early marriage twice through to prostitution and unplanned pregnancy, she recounted her torrid time.
“My story is a tragedy and I hope to share it today. My mother was divorced by my father when I was young. She remarried but the marriage failed. She got married again and then took me to the Niger Republic. She later died.”
