President Muhammadu Buhari’s wife, Aisha, has said that the country needs a woman like the late matriarch of the Awolowo family, Hannah Idowu Dideolu, whom she described as a dutiful wife and a role model to Nigerian women.
She said this on Wednesday during her condolence visit to the Ikenne home of the family.
The President’s wife, who arrived Ikenne at 2.45pm, was accompanied by the wife of the Vice-President, Dolapo Osinbajo; wife of the immediate past Governor of Rivers State, Mrs. Judith Amaechi; and a former deputy governor of Plateau State, Mrs. Pauline Tallen.
Aisha Buhari said it was sad that she learnt that Mama HID Awolowo was about celebrating her 100 birthday when she passed on.
She said, “We were here during the last campaign. Mama received us very well. I was even surprised I was asking Mrs. Osinbajo how old was she. She said she was getting to 100 years.
“And that we are going to celebrate her 100th year this year, by next month. So it is sad today to pay our last respect to our dear mother, and grandmother and mother to the whole nation.
“We all know the role Mama played as a dutiful mother, as a dutiful housewife. She was a role model to a lot of women. Her death is a great loss to the nation. This is the type of a woman Nigeria needs. She was a backbone of the family. “
Responding, the eldest daughter of the deceased, Mrs. Omotola Oyediran, thanked the President’s wife and members of her entourage, stressing that the Awolowo family appreciated her and her husband for their love for the family.
She recalled that it was due to their late mother’s loyalty and support for her late husband, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, that made him to refer to her as his “jewel of an inestimable value.”
She urged Nigerian women to emulate her by being honest and loyal to their husband.
She said, “I want to plead with us women to be honest in whatever we do, we have to be loyal to our spouses and we have to be able to stand by them through thick and thin.
“The reason Mama has been so well celebrated is because of her steadfastness.”
She said despite the fact that Mama in her lifetime lost some of her children, she did not curse God, but bore it all with calmness.
She added, “She experienced a lot of grief, but she did not curse God. There were five of us, my eldest late brother who was a barrister died at the age of 24, and then of course myself, then my late brother, the former publisher of Nigerian Tribune, and then the mother of the wife of the vice-president and then my little sister.
“And through her period of grief she did not curse God. She knew it was going to be well and that is a lesson.”
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