Military to Institute Vocational & Entrepreneurial Training Centers for Military Widows
Virginia Agada
The Director, Veterans Affairs Department Defence headquarters, Major General LF Abdullahi on, Monday 12 October 2020 stated during a forum held by MIWA that military authorities have anticipated the establishment of vocational and entrepreneurial training Centers specially for the training of widows of Nigerian Military personnel who eventually die or been killed within the time frame of active service as to influence and empower the military widows and their children.
Stating further, the Major General pointed out that the authorities have proposed the quarterly training of a particular batch of the widows from the year 2021 to help them stand on their own and begin self sustaining ventures.
Though he said the proposal is yet to be approved, d a further proposal for some level of level of financial support to be paid to military widows from next year is also before government noting that they are all geared towards ameliorating the hardship of the widows and their children.
The maiden MIWA Week event held from 12th to 13th October at the Nigerian Army Resource Center, Abuja turned out to be a reliefing moment for the Nigerian Military widows in the history of the nation.
In his remarks, the Minister of Defence, Major General Bashir Magashi (Rtd), who was represented by his Special Assistant, Major General Ahmed Tijani Jubril (rtd) commended the military widows who in spite of the agony of losing their husbands and facing difficult challenges, found time to come together to work towards upliftment of the less privileged among them.
The minister assured the military widows that he will continue to identify with their activities and promised to support MIWA in the quest to build a befitting secretariat in Abuja.
The Defence minister however urged the widows to go further in their mobilization to not only officer’s widows, but also widows of soldiers so that, “you carry them along in anything you are doing”.
The Director General, Nigerian Army Resource Center, Major General Garba Ayodeji Wahab (rtd) delivered a paper on ‘Life Outside the Barracks and Healing Memories’ where he advised and postulated various ideas and opportunities of what the widows can do to survive the new status they have found themselves
Major Gen Garba Wahab (RTD) recieving a plaque
President of MIWA, Mrs. Veronica Aloko in her address titled, ‘The Destiny of a Grieving Woman’ said, “For several days and months, and years after the cold hands of death severed her other half, a widow remains in strict morning, remembering the friendly and cheerful moments she had shared with her late spouse, moments devoid of regrets and sadness”.
“Of course, days of family monthly allowance, of family picnics and outdoor activities, of fatherly protection and love, are definitely over. Deprivation with its denial of middle income provision, happiness and family respect take over the mantle of fatherhood. The prize is not only ideological for the widow and her children, it is family devaluation based on how the widow and her children forge ahead in the cold, unfriendly, fast moving highways of human life.
She said the ministry of Defence approved the establishment of the widows association in December 2016, not as a pressure group going to the military authorities but to functions to relief its members from the anguish of the supreme sacrifices made by their spouses, thus making it bearable for their kin they left behind.
