By Sola Oni
The seat of a deputy governor is hardly wrought of the comfy cushion and dreamy stuff frequently ascribed to it. Like the governor’s seat it attracts the drudgery of daunting challenges and endless labour. But unlike the governor’s seat, the seat of the Nigerian deputy governor attracts ceaseless spells of irritation and extreme anxiety. When the deputy governor is female, woe betide her pitiful life, many would say.
The life of a female deputy governor is perpetually worse than her male peers’. While her ascension to the high office attracts interminable envy from fellow women, the life and work of a female deputy governor, is neither charming to the eyes nor appealing to the dreams.
But not a few women would die to experience the perks associated to the exalted office. Such women should be careful what they wish for. Beyond the wide smiles that crease the faces of the average female deputy governor on inauguration day, all is never well within their offices and their homes.
Their initial encounter with the daunting challenges of the high office begin to manifest once they leave their matrimonial homes, usually with their husbands, to dwell in their temporary but constitutional abode in the State House.
Avoidable rancour, misunderstandings and various forms of emotional turbulence and paranoia tirelessly plague the homes and senses of the deputy governors thus bringing them at loggerheads with their husbands more often than anyone could count. And besides the business of governance to which they dissipate much of their energy, loneliness begins to afflict them.
They are never held or treated with due honour and privileges deserving of their offices by their principals and captains of their ship, the governors of their states and back home, they face even greater challenges as they are frequently involved in squabbles with their husbands who persistently detest their inability to fulfill their marital obligations due to the demands of their high offices.
Thus it is always lonely nights of agonies day after day until time permits them to take a quick break to fulfill other crucial obligations in their lives. But it is often the case that when they take time off to attend to other pressing obligations, it is always too late. Almost all the female deputy governors suffer this fate. On the receiving of such brutal fate are the Lagos, Ogun and Osun States deputy governors respectively. Ask Oluranti Adebule, the deputy governor of Lagos State, she would confirm this.
