By Palma Ileye
Another feather has been added to the cap of the Minister of Women Affairs, Dame Pauline Tallen as the United Nations Association of Nigeria conferred the Award for Most Outstanding Woman in Politics and Policy Matters.
The award was conferred on the Minister, through the President of the United Nations Association of Nigeria, Dr. Joan Agha who led a team of three, with the two others as Dr. Omopeju Afanu, the Secretary-General and Chika Nwaozuzu, Ex-Officio member of the Association to bring in the award.
Agha of the UN Association of Nigeria disclosed that the Association was about 63 years old, founded by the late Prof. Babs Fafunwa.
“It is affiliated to World Federation of United Nation’s Associations, existing in about 103 Countries,” she said.
She stated that the body interfaces with the nationals of these countries on the ideals of the United Nations.
The Association, she said, gives vent and practicality to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, SDGs, talking about hunger, poverty, gender-equality, water and sanitation, environment or climate issues, and partnering with others to solve identified challenges of humans stating that it does fund-raise to augment what the Association has to operate.
The President of the Association, Agha disclosed the process of the Award for Most Outstanding Woman in Politics and Policy Matters as being in two stages: the Nomination stage and the Voting Stage.
She revealed that Dame Tallen was popularly nominated by majority of Nigerians for the category and when this was subjected to voting, the Honourable Minister of Women Affairs emerged having garnered majority of the votes.
Agha added that when she took time out to check out Dame Pauline Tallen on Wikipedia, she discovered that those who did the nomination and the voting for Dame Pauline Tallen to emerge, couldn’t have had other personae to emerge.
Although the exigencies of work have taken the Minister out of Abuja and couldn’t receive the award by herself, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry who too couldn’t be available, was represented by the Director of Economic Services of the Ministry, Mr. Idris Mohammed.
Mohammed remarked that that given the thorough process of nomination and voting in the category of the Award for Most Outstanding Woman in Politics and Policy Matters, the Ministry’s management and staff, given the hindsight of knowing the several outstanding achievements of Dame Pauline Tallen, were not surprised that she emerged to get the global award.
The representative of the Permanent Secretary who also stood in to receive the award on behalf of Dame Pauline Tallen extended the appreciation of the Management and Staff of the Ministry to the UN Association of Nigeria, the voters in the award category.
Mohammed, in further response to the request for partnership, pledged the readiness of the Ministry to partner with the UN Association in every area of the mandates of the Ministry which may catch the fancy of the Association.
