The first of four panel discussions on Day One of the 3rd Annual General Conference of the NBA Women Forum in Abuja was titled, ‘ACCELERATING HER CAREER THROUGH TECHNOLOGY.’ Moderated by Mimi Ayua, Managing Partner at Wells & Pitchers LP, the panel’s brief was to address the reality (or otherwise) of the proverbial ‘gender gap’ in the Nigerian legal profession, it’s nature and dimensions if real, what efforts have been so far been made to eradicate it or mitigate its effects on the profile and fortunes of female wigs, and propose ways in which tech adoption can herald a different and more positive narrative.
NEWSWIRE Law and Events Magazine correspondent in Abuja reports that the panel was composed of Chika Idoko, Regional Head, DEI at the British Council; Abimo Toyosi Olayiwola, Principal Partner at the law firm of ABI Legal Barristers & Solicitors; Lolia Biobele-Georgewill, a Senior Associate at G. Elias & Co.; as well as the only male panelist (and a widely-recognised champion of female empowerment, aka a ‘He for She’) in the person of the former Attorney-General and Honorable Commissioner for Justice in Ekiti State, Wale Fapohunda, SAN.
In response to the question of whether or not there exists a gender gap in the profession, Fapohunda said the question was a no-brainer (considering the disproportionately small number of new female silk and Judges/Justices in recent years). The real question to ask, he said, is whether the Nigerian law community is willing to acknowledge this anomaly, and muster the political will necessary to address it in a meaningful and fundamental way. While admitting that the deployment of technology is useful, to a great extent, in addressing the imbalance between the genders, the former Ekiti A-G was emphatic in maintaining that tech alone cannot bring about the needed sea-change without the human element, i.e. willingness on the part of stakeholders to accept the corrosive effect of this imbalance, and readiness to confront it head-on. He concluded by decrying the low level of record- (and gate-) keeping in the profession as far as the numbers on female progression are concerned.
In her contribution, Toyosi Olayiwola, addressed the issue of how women can use tech to become thought leaders by doing a recap of what the tech has ALREADY done to change the face of legal practice, such as a drastic reduction in man-hours needed to carry through a task or transaction; greater access to relevant research sources and more effective documentation, etc. The way forward for female lawyers, she said, was to build on these advances in an intentional way.
Loliya Biobele-Georgewill also spoke in the same vein as Toyosi, adding that when it came to the full use of online platforms like LinkedIn for career and professional advancement, not many female lawyers (especially the young ones who are supposedly internet ‘natives’) are firing on all cylinders.
Echoing the learned silk’s thoughts on record-keeping and measurement of progress (or otherwise) Idoko also called on female lawyers to strive to be more visible. She also called for older and more accomplished legal practitioners to be more intentional about mentoring the rising generation of lawyers.
In her summation, the moderator, Ayua, reeled out a recently-released report on the subject of gender disparity by a reputable international organization – to the effect that it would take 132 years to bridge the global gender gap. While unpalatable, she said, this alarming statistic and its implications can be mitigated by adopting the right attitudes (as advocated by the learned Senior Advocate, Fapohunda, and by Idoko) and the intelligent use of tech (as advocated by Olayiwola and Biobele-Georgewill).
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