The Office of the Wife of the Governor in Nigeria plays a complimentary role to any administration as one of its key responsibilities is to ensure that the rights of children, women and the less privileged in the society are protected.
According to a 2007 UNICEF report, gender equality improves the lives of women and has a positive effect on child well-being and development. Despite progress in women’s status in recent decades, the lives of millions of women still remain bedeviled by discrimination, disempowerment and poverty.
So when her husband Prof Ben Ayade was elected Governor of Cross River State Linda, a medical practitioner, embarked on programmes to help the less fortunate in the society. Dr Ayade, as she is known, says it takes conscience to cater to the plight of rural dwellers and the less privileged. “My desire to help the less privileged is not something I picked up when my husband became Governor; rather from the time I was a teenager; I deliberately chose Medicine and Surgery, a helping profession. I did not dream to become rich by practicing medicine… but that my patients would wake up healthier and able to pursue their goals in life,” she says.
This is indeed the force that has propelled Dr Ayade to incorporate a foundation known as Mediatrix Development Foundation (MDF) as a platform of assistance to the vulnerable and through which she can lead advocacy for the rights of children, women and the less privileged, as well as improve the living conditions for widows and the aged in Cross River State and Africa at large.
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During the 2015 Retreat of the United Nations Joint Team on AIDS – Nigeria held in Calabar from 5th to 7th October, 2015, her vision and pet project were presented by the Chairman of the Board of Mediatrix Development Foundation, Manz Denga. For starters, these top UNAIDS officials took an unprecedented step after the presentation: they commenced a technical session in which they commended the presentation, deliberated on the presentation of the governor’s wife and, one week later, couched a clear Vision and Mission Statement for Mediatrix Development Foundation. This is, perhaps, the first glimpse into the glorious partnerships that the UN will undertake with the First Lady of Cross River State in the nearest future.
UNAIDS Country Director in Nigeria, Bilali Camara, has described the project as ‘a wonderful idea’ that will change the lives of many people. He believes that Dr Ayade’s programmes, though varied, are in tandem with the health initiative of the Nigerian President’s wife, Mrs. Aisha Buhari.
The Foundation will prioritise her interventions around three main areas of interest: the protection of orphans and vulnerable children; social support for women and the aged as well as healthcare. As a first step towards advocacy for the rights of the girl-child in Becheve in Obanliku Local Government Area, the governor’s wife is working on a documentary film that will draw the attention of police, lawmakers in the State and the international community to the practice of forced early marriage. She believes that this will ensure the enforcement of the Child Right Laws of Cross River State that have been in place since 2009.
The governor’s wife understands that literacy is the most powerful accelerator of sustainable development and has already started making an in-road into education and literary with her essay and quiz competitions. Mrs Ayade has also started a Summer Holiday Camp aimed at entrenching in children’s minds a reading culture as well as helping them to develop a desire for knowledge rather than merely passing examinations by all means. The month-long holiday camps will have centres throughout the eighteen Local Government Areas of the State. She hopes that parents, educators, government and development partners will contribute to literacy in the state by supporting this programme.
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In health, Dr. Linda Ayade has set up Hunt Malaria Initiative (HMI) to reduce the burden of malaria and its related diseases. HMI employs a unique club system that operates in tertiary institutions, secondary and primary schools, and in communities through collaborative efforts with various stakeholders. Dr. Ayade’s Mother and Child Health Initiative will focus on sensitization and regular health talks on family planning, HIV/AIDS prevention, amongst others. She hopes to hinge on her training and experience as a medical practitioner to take the campaign against HIV/AIDS scourge to every nook and crannies of the state until no child is born with HIV/AIDS in Cross River State.
The Mobile Health Diagnostic and Immediate Remedy Clinic is another of her designs to fill the existing gap in immediate and early life saving diagnosis and provision of primary intervention in some prevalent killer diseases.
These ideas may sound mind-boggling as the governor’s wife focuses on programme dimensioning, human resource development, fund-raising, purchase of books and medical equipment, amongst other things, but the need for Cross River women and children to live fulfilling and healthy lives justifies any amount of resources that will go into realizing them. The new Cross River State of our dream where no child goes to bed hungry as espoused by His Excellency, Senator (Prof.) Ben Ayade requires the complement that Dr Linda Ayade brings to the table through her organization, Mediatrix Development Foundation.
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