In the spirit of commemorating 2025 International Women’s Day, PUNCH Media Foundation hosted its PUNCH Webinar Series with the theme, For ALL Women and Girls: Rights. Equality. Empowerment on Thursday, 27 March 2025. The event, held on Zoom and livestreamed on the Facebook page and X handle of PUNCH Newspapers, was moderated by Kemi Abimbola, a Chief Correspondent at The PUNCH. Present at the virtual event were policymakers, media professionals, civil society advocates, and concerned members of the public.
Taofik Sanni, Communications Lead at PUNCH Media Foundation, opened the session by welcoming both the panellists and participants to the webinar, indicating that their presence signifies their commitment to gender justice. He emphasised that the PUNCH Webinar Series serves as a platform to address critical issues aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, urging collective action to challenge norms, remove systemic barriers, and empower women and girls for broader societal impact.
The conversation was opened by Professor Bolanle Clara Simeon‑Fayomi, a distinguished academic and strategic leader in adult education and lifelong learning. She noted that women must be open to beneficial mentorship so that they can grow and position themselves for opportunities because the power that lies in the society to give women what they need to be who they want to be is enormous. She, therefore, urged collective action to dismantle social barriers, noting that true empowerment demands a readiness from communities to support women’s aspirations.
Digging deeper into issues of financial inclusion for women, Hamzat Lawal, the founder and CEO, Connected Development, examined the nation’s financial inclusion efforts, emphasising the necessity of designing gender‑responsive financial products and incentives. He argued that meaningful progress hinges on tailoring policy frameworks to the unique economic realities of women and girls. He alluded to a few programmes of the government geared towards financial inclusion for women, commended the efforts, and called for more inclusive financial programmes and incentives.
Adepeju Jaiyeoba, a seasoned lawyer and the lead partner at Strichland Law Practice, turned the spotlight on legal reforms, exposing how current penal provisions perpetuate inequality by treating similar offences differently based on the victim’s gender. She called for a comprehensive overhaul of discriminatory statutes to guarantee equal protection under the law, as no significant progress can be achieved without enabling statutory provisions that are enforceable.
Contributing to the conversation from the prism of media representation, systemic biases, and cultural barriers affecting gender parity, Melony Ishola, a multimedia journalist, FGM eradication campaigner, and the Head of Programmes, PUNCH Videos, explained that women wear many hats, which make it more challenging for them to succeed than their male counterparts. She reminded participants that personal and cultural conditioning begin in private spaces, shaping public outcomes for women. She stressed that addressing these foundational biases is essential for women to achieve genuine leadership and success.
Beyond the insights shared by the panellists, participants also had the opportunity to lend their voices to the conversation. Among the participants who spoke was Prof. Abigail Ogwezzy‑Ndisika, Head of Mass Communication at the University of Lagos. She stated that while mentorship contributes significantly to empowering women and the girl child, there must be the readiness on the part of the mentees to submit to its rigours. Also, she stressed that the media must make conscious moves to churn out content and narratives that advance gender justice.
To close out the webinar, Moses Ademola, Programme Officer, PUNCH Media Foundation, appreciated the panellists and participants for their virtual presence, and contributions to the success of the event. He expressed confidence that the insights gleaned by participants during the event will help revolutionise their efforts towards promoting gender equity and equality and will ultimately promote development, which is central to the focus of the PUNCH Webinar series.
