Mabel Onwuemele is the executive director, Women of Purpose Development Foundation. She is also a public speaker, an author, and sex therapist. In this interview with ENE OSHABA she shares her experience battling post-natal trauma and harps on economic empowerment of women as a means of curbing Gender Based Violence (GBV).
What is the Foundation is about and what inspired you into charity works?
The Women of Purpose Development Foundation was established to champion the course of women economically.
The story behind the NGO is my personal story because I am from a very humble background and while growing up I used to envisage the life other privileged kids. This made me angry and hunger for success and I knew, even at a young age, that the only way for me was through education but my parents couldn’t afford this.
I had to be of service to my pastors, elders and all just to get favour from them and luckily they supported my education without taking advantage of me.
I finished my secondary education and my dad said I should get married because he couldn’t afford university education but I prayed to God to give me a good man who would train me in school.
God blessed me with a caring man and I told him I wanted to go to school and not to have a sexual relationship, he accepted and it took me one year and seven months to accept his marriage proposal. He took care of my university education and along the line we got married.
When I got into Delta State University I started my NGO then as Girls of Purpose because I saw a lot of girls going through challenges and I thought there should be a way to help each other because I was in same situation and I am a product of help too.
I brought us together and we taught each other different skills so we could survive. I learnt how to bake right from school and other girls learnt different skills right there at school.
How were you able to achieve it since women are said not to support each other?
I don’t know about that cliché but we supported each other a lot when I was in school, even when I graduated and got married and I was now living in Lagos state I continued the charity but changed the name to Women of Purpose.
What we did basically was to pray together, preach to each other and encourage us to have something doing. So, it was more of an empowerment organisation.
You do a lot of medical outreaches. What is your inspiration?
I am that woman who has suffered many afflictions in the flesh and just like Apostle Paul, I prayed that the Lord would remove the constant pain but He said His Grace was sufficient for me.
When I had my last baby, it was through a caesarian section. I was opened up three times within 12 days, I received 27 pints of blood, uncountable drips and antibiotics, yet, the hospital said my survival was a 50-50 chance but God gave me a second chance at life.
I stayed in the hospital for three months and I couldn’t use my legs but by God’s grace I escaped death by the whiskers. It took sometime before I could get back to my normal life as I began to learn how to walk again like a baby.
In February this year, I began to notice some sharp pains again on my back, waist region and at the hospital; I was told I was suffering from child birth trauma. After some x-rays and medication, I was told to start physiotherapy that the condition of the back had degenerated due to negligence on my part by not going for regular check-ups.
I couldn’t sit, stand, nor walk. We went from general hospital to a specialist hospital where different medications was administered yet no glimpse of hope. I went through excruciating pain which was worse than labour pain and in fact worse than oxytocin injection, but there was no drug that could calm the pain.
I was, however, advised to go for an epidural; the pain was intense, worse than any pain I’ve ever gone through. I lived with this pain for many days, weeks, and Months.
After three epidural, a process which was so expensive, I could not still walk, I couldn’t write nor carry out my daily routines again.
I started going for physiotherapy to aid my walking. I lost many speaking jobs during this period. People were contacting me for speaking sessions but I was not able to honour the invitations. The period of this pain really brought me more closer to God.
It showed me another purpose for which I was born, which is to care for the physically challenged, sensitise on female post-natal care, delivery of maternity kits to indigenous pregnant women who cannot afford it in communities, and training of local birth attendants on safe delivery of our infants in rural communities. This I have promised myself and God.
I suffered immensely due to childbirth and saw many women lose their lives in the hospital during childbirth within the time frame I was hospitalised and it broke my heart. During that same time, I witnessed the death of a 20-year-old first time mum after having her beautiful girl. I lost my best friend and sister through this same societal menace. Then I asked myself why should any woman die while bringing forth life?
Millions lose their lives through carelessness of some medical practitioners and lack of basic health care system in place. In my own case, a certain object was forgotten in my body and that was the reason for the multiple surgeries on me. The trauma is better imagined than experienced.
We must stop maternal mortality and this is why I engage in medical outreaches especially in the grassroots.
Due to the high cost of physiotherapy I also opened a very affordable quick response center for treating child-birth trauma, acute waist pain, low back pain, arthritis, hip/bone dislocation, lumbar spondylosis, stiffness, paralysis, and general body massage to help women especially.
How many women have you empowered so far?
That would be over 1,000 so far but it’s not just financial empowerment, we do skill empowerment, counseling among others.
Empowerment for women cannot be overemphasized. It’s something very important that can disrupt so many negative stereotypes like domestic violence.
There is a particular woman who came to us for advice, her husband was cheating on her and she called the lady to stop dating her husband. Her husband felt slighted by her actions and left the house asking her to go and apologise to his mistress before he could return.
She went on bended knees before her husband’s mistress yet the man refused to come back home. Do you think an economically empowered woman will stoop so low to do that or remain in a violent relationship just to stay married?
Economic empowerment leads to self realisation and self worth and would enable you make some decisions about your life. We live in a patriarchal society where women are marginalised, their voices don’t count, and they are suppressed and repressed.
However, with economic empowerment all the vices against women will be totally reduced if not eradicated.
What’s your take on feminism?
In Nigeria, feminism is misconstrued. A female pastor has once said that feminism cannot be practiced in Nigeria especially in marriage but that is her own knowledge of feminism. Such women pastors fail to understand that holding the microphone and talking in the public is feminism. Feminism basically is equality for all, but here in Nigeria it’s been twisted to connote bossiness, disrespectful women, women who don’t believe in marriage and all that.
I am a feminist but I am the most adorable wife to my husband because he understands the concept and supports me to the greatest heights and through him my voice finds expression. He is not scared about my growth and also is not scared of pushing me to the top.
Chimamanda Adichie said Nigerians have not understood the construct of feminism and many are still boxed up in the miscommunication. I respect my husband a lot; he respects me and understands that marriage is a synergy.
Feminists still have a huge work of explaining this concept to lots of Nigerians that women can work today is a product of feminism.
It’s been said that gender parity would take 200 years to be achieved in Nigeria but I still do know that we are not where we used to be, we are making progress.
What are your greatest achievements so far?
We have achieved a lot in empowering women economically and also changing their orientation about life to have purpose and also let them know that marriage is good but not all the achievement they should aspire for.
Women should strive beyond marriage; we should strive to achieve more. They should stretch beyond their bounds and know that women can also be president.
We have empowered women with different skills and also provided working equipments and start up funds through partnership with five friendly banks. We give women loans from N50,000 to N1,000,000 with little interest and a payback time margin of six months to enable them start a business. Men too have benefitted from our loan scheme.
In 2016, we got a grant from CBN and we were able to empower 500 women. We have visited orphanage homes in Lagos, IDP camps in Abuja and we have given out a lot to them and we keep empowering more.
You are a sex therapist, what exactly do you do?
Yes, I teach relationship and I am also an author. I teach couples how to their enjoy sex life in their marriages because I got to understand through the marriages I have seen that mostly after one year romance is no longer there.
I wrote a book titled: Sex And You to demystify sex and marriage. I also discovered that most problematic marriages were due to lack of communication skills from both women and men. Churches don’t talk about sex, the society doesn’t let us talk about it and women are suffering.
In Africa, if a woman says she is not sexually satisfied she will be tagged a prostitute. Men too suffer due to lack of communication and we are beginning to change that narrative.
How best can issues of women be addressed?
I totally agree that women issues can be addressed through leadership positions and inclusion in governance.
As the election year is drawing closer women should know that they are worthy to vote and be voted for. I advocate for more women in political positions so they can help us push more policies. Before, I did not vote during elections because I cared less but with various advocacies on women’s rights I now know the importance of voting and I will support women who vie for positions not just women but those with capacity and I believe I can also be voted for.
I call on women to ensure they are registered so that they can vote in the upcoming elections.
