Hajiya (Dr.) Titilayo Amina Atiku Abubakar, the first wife of Nigeria’s former vice president and
Turakin Adamawa, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar comes across as a humble, motherly figure with strength
of character. The 61 year old grandmother has for a long time been speaking with a loud voice against the travails of women and children
through her pet project, Women Trafficking and Child Labour Eradication Foundation (WOTCLEF)
as the platform. The University of Calabar, in recognition of, and
obviously impressed with her efforts at restoring back the human dignity into the society, conferred on her the honorary Doctor of Science (Social
Work). Hajiya Abubakar is a very hardworking person. Before joining her husband in the Presidency, she was a lecturer at the popular Kaduna Polytechnic where she worked for ten
years. She effectively combined her teaching job with household chores and responsibilities. “I love
taking care of my family”, she said.
Being born into a Christian home in Lagos to the Albert family from Ilesa, in Osun State, she did her primary and secondary education at Catholic
schools, after which she was swept off her feet by the love of Atiku Abubakar, and had to get married. “It was in her husband house she attended Kaduna Polytechnic. Humility attracted her
husband to her even at her very young age.
With her passion for helping the distressed, she quickly swung into action when she became wife
of the nation’s number two citizen when she founded WOTCLEF in October 1999. Having lectured in Kaduna Polytechnic, she interacted with so many girls in the classrooms and became instantly interested in their welfare to the extent
that when anybody was absent in class, she was used to asking after her whereabouts. “And, the answer I used to get then was that they were
travelling to Rome. People’s perception was that
Rome is a Christian country where people visit for the holy pilgrimage. So, as a lecturer myself, I went to further my education in Rome and I was there between 1986 and 1987. It was while I was in Rome that I saw so many girls on the streets. She worked hard and
sponsored a Bill which was drafted and taken to the National Assembly in 2001 during the Senate Presidency of Senator Pius Anyim Pius. She was
at the National Assembly to defend the Bill. It passed through the law making stages and the National Assembly passed it and it received
Presidential assent in 2003. This bill which became law gave birth to the tough National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, NAPTIP.
