Dr Doyin Abiola, Prof. Elfrida Adebo, Major General Aderonke Kale – Extraordinary Nigerian women who made history in male-dominated fields

Greatness may not be gender-based, but women have always been stereotyped as emotionally weak and intellectually inferior to men. Although this is 2020, gender stereotyping is still rife, many people grow into it. Right from when they are babies, society has taught them what is ‘manly’ and ‘ladylike’.

The tide is changing as more women have continued to break the barrier of gender stereotypes to make history and prove to the world that there is no distinction between what they carry inside their skulls and what men carry.

Here are some exceptional Nigerian women who have distinguished themselves by making history in male-dominated fields

1. Dr Doyin Abiola – First Female Newspaper Editor

Dr. Doyinsola Abiola (nee Aboaba) made history in 1980 as the first woman to become editor of a national newspaper in Nigeria. It is a height many journalists dream to attain as the peak of their long years of career. She didn’t only make history as Nigeria’s first female editor, she attained the height at age 35.

She didn’t get there by happenstance, Dr Abiola rose through the ranks as a reporter with the defunct Daily Sketch where she started her journalism exploit after bagging a degree in English and Drama from the University of Ibadan in 1969. She left the job for the United States for her Masters programme in Journalism. On her return to Nigeria after her Masters programme, she dodged an attempt to be served a full dose of gender stereotype when she rejected the position of Woman Editor at the Daily Times on the grounds that it was an attempt to limit her. She would later be offered the position of Features Writer and became the Group Features Editor of the newspaper.

She returned to the U.S in 1976 for her Ph.D. programme and resumed duty at Daily Times in 1979. A year later, she joined the newly established Concord Newspapers owned by Chief MKO Abiola in 1980 as its pioneer daily editor. In two years, she rose to become director/editor-in-chief and in 1984 when the pioneer Managing Director, Chief Henry Odukomaiya, was bowing out, Dr Doyin was seen as a perfect fit to replace him and was elevated as the Group Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief.

“An incredulous public was soon convinced that there is nothing about the office that should make it an exclusive preserve of men. She adroitly ran the newspaper and it became a reference point,” The Nation newspaper wrote in a 2015 editorial to celebrate her 70th birthday.

Dr Doyin Abiola who was married to Chief MKO Abiola (acclaimed winner of 1993 presidential election) blazed the trail in a male-dominated field of journalism and proved that greatness cannot be limited by gender.

2. Prof. Elfrida Adebo – First Professor of Nursing 

Prof Elfrida Adebo was another extraordinary Nigerian woman who proved that the intellectual ability of women is not lower when put in contrast to their male counterparts. In the academic field dominated by men, Adebo made history in 1984 when she became the first professor of nursing in Nigeria.

She is also reputed to have delivered the first inaugural lecture given by a nurse in Nigeria. She started her nursing career in London before returning to Nigeria to take up a job as a Public Health Nurse in Ibadan, Oyo State, in 1959. She worked briefly as an Instructor at the School of Hygiene in Ibadan before crossing over to the University of Ibadan to become a lecturer where she would later become the Head of Department of Nursing.

She was a member of the World Health Organisation (WHO) Experts Advisory Panel on Nursing in 1973 and several other committees locally and internationally. Prof Adebo was also a consultant to Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Health and other international organisations.

3. Major General Aderonke Kale – First Female Major-General

From time immemorial, if there is one field considered as a career path meant ‘strictly for men’, it is the military. Despite this, Major General Aderonke Kale went in, broke records and set new ones that have become reference points for many women venturing into ‘men’s profession’.

In 1994, she became the first woman in Nigeria to reach the level of Major General in the Nigerian Army. It was unprecedented in the history of the nation.

Kale’s decision to enlist in the Army in 1972 must have left her contemporaries and some members of her family in awe. They must have questioned the decision of a female medical doctor to join the army, at a time when it is believed that only men join the army. It was a year after she returned from the University of London where she had gone to specialize in Psychiatry after graduating as a medical doctor from the then University College, now University of Ibadan.

She rose through the ranks to become Commanding Officer of the Military Hospital in Ibadan from 1980 to 1985; Military Hospital, Enugu from 1985 to 1987, and the Military Hospital, Benin from 1989 to 1990. Not long after she was Deputy Commandant, Nigerian Army Medical Corps and School from 1991 to 1994.

1994 was a remarkable year for Kale, it was the year she became the first female Commandant of the Nigerian Medical Corps and also became the first Major General in the Nigerian Army. She retired from the army in 1996 after 24 years in service.

The female hall of residence at the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA) was named after her in 2011. She dipped her feet in a world dominated by men and never allowed the usual stereotyping to limit her greatness.