With excitement, Aishatu raced home with the great news she carry. She was screaming her mother a great deal of distance away from the house. Of course she knew her mother couldn’t hear. Her mother was probably consumed with cooking in the kitchen or was at the backyard, washing clothes or doing anything she could lay hands on.

As expected, Aishatu found her mother at the backyard.

“saanu mama”.

“why the excitement? Has musa finally asked you?” the elderly woman asked. Still buried in her chores.

Aishatu waved away her mother’s comment.

“its more, mama. More. Guess”

“the only guess I can come up with is what you’ve discarded”

“it’s medicine. I’ve been offered admission to study medicine. I will be a doctor, mama. A Doctor!”. The younger lady was screaming with Joy.

This time, her mother dropped the blouse she had just picked to wash.

“what did you say?”

“I will be a doctor!”.

“not in my house!”. Aishatu’s mother expression had gone from being unconcerned to being furious. “isn’t doctor ten years to study? Add your age to ten, Who will marry you a Doctor? No, an old doctor! You are due enough as it is. Now you want to add ten years more?! Allah forbids it”.

This is the story of many other women all over Nigeria especially the northern part. Aishatu is among the five million girls that drop out of school due to discrimination. First, this idea, this mental thoughts that girls should not be allowed into the classrooms, that they have nothing to offer or nothing to be offered anything. That girls don’t need western education; the only kind of education they need is the ones from their mother which is on how to be a better cook, a better sexual partner, a better maid and a better mother. Again, that the only purpose a girl was created for was to be married. Not married as a woman when all the men would feel she’s old and won’t perform her duties well. But married as a girl when her bones are strong, her womanhood is fresh and firm and Her very strong womb would carry strong, unlimited children.

Well, Aishatu obeyed her mother and never went for that course she had been given. She married Musa a year after at age sixteen and now thirty years later, she sits on this seat of regret. But who really cares about how she feels? Her mother? Her husband? The society where she finds herself? No one.

But this is the question. How can you know the ability of a girl if you limit her to one thing; marriage. Or afraid she might surpass the men and soar like an eagle above them all? Statistics has shown that there are over 1.1 billion creative and talented girls worldwide and if these talents are exploited the right way is enough to build a global community that has the potential of creating a sustainable world.

Hence, the girl child has equal right to education. And not just to education, because you might stop her education at the basic level and justify she’s educated. No, she has the equal right to education and to equal education. Yes, meaning she can go as far as her legs and brain would carry her. She can become everything she wants to become. It’s her right, she’s entitled to it. Do not take it away from her. Education is the only and true route to a girl child’s liberation.

By Oyewole Peace

Source: http://ngonewsnigeria.com/equal-right-education-girl-child/