Women in academia face significant challenges, including caregiving responsibilities and systemic barriers that hinder their career growth.
This situation has also led many women to become overwhelmed, stagnated at lower levels, or leave the academic space entirely.
These issues are often misunderstood as personal shortcomings rather than institutional problems.
Against this background, the Faculty of Law, University of Lagos, Women Advocates Research and Documentation Centre, WARDC and Co-Impact set out to solve the disparity.
Law experts, law teachers, head of departments in professorial and doctorate levels came together in Lagos as a consortium to brainstorm on framework that would change the narrative on the troubling situation.
To this end, Professor Abdulquadir Ibrahim Abikan, the Director General of the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, NIALS, recommended an enabling environment to prevent the dearth of women academia.
He highlighted this on Thursday at the inception and on-boarding meeting for the design phase of the initiative, themed: “Advancing Women’s Rights and Breaking Barriers for an Inclusive Future for Law Faculties in Nigeria.”
Prof. Abikan is of the view, that to prevent women from disappearing from academia, there is a need to create a more supportive environment that enables their growth.
According to him, “We are looking at a situation where we put an environment that even as they are going through their women peculiarity, probably we reduce their workload. We could attach some people to them to assess them during this period and even when there is need to progress, those people are also given consideration in whatever we put together to rate them.
“It has been discovered over the years that our women in academic generally, particularly in the law academics, experience a lot of challenges that forms a stumbling block for their progression in their career.
He juxtaposed his recommendation with observation in the career journey of men and women.
Speaking further, the Director General said, “Like their male counterpart, they have to go through the same procedure of advancing in their careers, whereas they have their own peculiarity of being women in marital peculiarity, peculiarity of raising their children and keeping their home.
“So we are looking at a situation where environment will be more conducive for them as they are combining their peculiarity with their career, they are able to also advance like their male counterpart.
“Quite a number of them in the course of their career have to get married like men, have children, raise children, these are peculiarities for women.
“So the law and policy governing their career progression does not actually recognise these peculiarities. It has now become a serious challenge that ladies are now finding it very difficult to progress, those who are choosing to be in the academics and it is like others are getting scared of even coming in.
“For instance, they are supposed to hold a position of responsibility that will go into their CV, but because of other challenges, they are even scared of taking this position.”
The Board Chair, WARDC, Professor Jummai Audi urged the attendees to confront, head-on, the structural, cultural, and institutional barriers that have for far too long kept women from ascending to the leadership positions they have more than earned within Nigeria’s legal academy.
According to the former Chairperson, Nigeria Law Reform, “The data tell a troubling story. Female law academics make up less than 20 percent of legal faculty nationally a share that shrinks further with every upward step in rank.”
She urged for an inclusive, gender-just future for women in Nigeria’s legal academy.
She posited that the idea is to have gender equity in progression. “There has to be equity. Equity means that both of them, the men and the women, have a role to play in the society. So it’s not like pushing one out of it.
“But because from the beginning, the women had lagged behind. Just like me. I lagged behind. When I came up later on, it was really difficult to be a professor and to be a chairman of a commission.
“It’s not an easy thing, but I know what I went through, so women actually go through a lot.
“They go through a lot in the faculties, in their homes, and so on and so forth. They have to bear children, they have to marry, they have to do house chores, they have to do so many things in life.
“So what are the things that will ease all those challenges and difficulties, the stress, that can make them turn out to work as senior academicians in the faculty, to teach law, to go out and practice it,” she asked.
In his welcome address, the Dean, Faculty of Law, UNILAG, Professor Abiola Sanni, SAN, who spoke on behalf of the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Folasade Ogunsola, said about the initiative, “It is a working session. While the broader research spans several years, our immediate task is clear: to design frameworks that will endure.
“The University of Lagos is honoured to serve as host and secretariat. We are encouraged by the strides made within our institution, including female leadership at the highest level and increasing representation within the Faculty. However, we must acknowledge that these gains remain modest and uneven across the system. That reality underscores the importance of this initiative.”
Professor John Oluwole Akintayo, the President of the Nigerian Association of Law Teachers, NALT, and Dean, Faculty of Law, University of Ibadan said, “This is a matter of great concern to us, advancing the interests of members of our association, especially the female members. There are some realities we cannot ignore. Childbirth is a miscellaneous experience, that’s how the society is enlarged, the demography in the society is not there, and the reality right now is that, even when you look at our law faculties, we seem to have more female students, and these female students are competent, they come out with fantastic grit.
“Now, the question would be that, if they decide to join the academia, we must put in place measures to ensure, first, that they are recruited, and also that they rise alongside with their male counterparts, because they are competent, they have the capacity.
“So, that’s the reason why the issues should be addressed, removing the barriers in the way of female law lecturers, is quite commendable.
“In the university where I am based, we have four female deans, which is, by Nigerian standards, a record. It’s quite significant and even in the faculty, we have more female lecturers than male lecturers.
‘But that is not the situation in many other faculties. In some faculties, we may not even have female lecturers at all, or they may be so few. So, if you now contrast that with when you now have more female students, so, you know, there’s a disconnect somewhere.
“Who will serve as mentors to these female students? We have to look at the prescription based on the peculiarities of each faculty. Some crèches have to be created to accommodate small children and in some places, the reality is that we must not be blind to the experiences of our female colleagues.
Dr. Ihuoma llobinso, from the Faculty of Law, Department of Commercial and Industrial Law, UNILAG could relate to the challenges confronting women in academia, she noted, “Most of the barriers that we are talking about with respect to women in academia, we have felt it. I have felt it at different points. Whether it’s at the point of entry, or whether it was at the point of progressing to the next level.
She added that the initiative aims to identify and address gaps through research and practical interventions, such as policy and workload reforms, in order to support women’s progression into leadership.
The UNILAG will serve as the coordinating hub, overseeing research, collaboration, and implementation of solutions.
During one of the presentations, Dr. Abiola Akiyode-Afolabi, Director, Centre for Safeguarding/Human Rights, Faculty of Law, UNILAG and Founder, WARDC highlighted the need to focus on inclusive future for women in academia.
