‘A Woman Who Depends On Her Man For Identity Would Crash’

Posted by admin Women Politics Saturday, June 2nd, 2012

fessor Mrs. Atim Antai is a professor of Physiology and the Dean, Faculty of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Calabar, Calabar. She is also the assistant pastor at the Revival Valley Ministry International, Calabar, Cross River State. In this interview with BLESSING EKUM, she speaks on the challenges of marriages in an era of shift in gender roles and other issues.

WHAT has been your the experience as a woman in authority?
I have been the head of department three times already, so, leadership is not really a new experience for me. Because of my other activities, not just the job, I don’t have much time for house-work and that bothers me. The university is an enlightened environment and so, most people are not opposed to the idea of having a woman in a position of authority. Issues of gender discrimination do not come up; you just do your work and it speaks for itself. I have never had an experience of being antagonized because I am a woman in authority. It so happens that I led men in 1999 till 2001 as the president of the Senior Staff Club and that is a position that is strictly for men and I am the only woman to have occupied that position. That is where one would have expected to have difficulties, because as of then I wasn’t yet a professor and these were men, who were titled chiefs, professors and so forth. Yet, I didn’t have any problems. I think it has to do, basically, with the fact that the academic environment is an enlightened one.

However, when I was head of department for the first time, I had problems with only one staff member because he seemed to resent the fact that I was younger than him.
How did you manage that staff member?
I used to get very angry at his behavior, but after a while I decided that there was nothing I could do to make him happy, so, I just did my work and lived my life.

Some parents usually want their children to read medical courses against the child’s wish. What has been your experience with this issue?
It’s tragic. I have come across quite a few who couldn’t cope because it was against their choice. There has been so many that have been forced to read medicine and half way through, they couldn’t continue and they had to drop out. Some end up reading paramedical courses, like biochemistry, anatomy and physiology. There was a particular case where a student dropped out entirely even from the physiology he came to read.

What would you propose as the way out?
Parents should not live the lives of their children for them. They should let them be. Each child is wired differently. What makes your child tick is not what would make you tick. Find out what they want and are good at, and encourage them to excel in that area.

In your years as a career woman, what advice would you give single women with career ambitions?
Actually, I am a widow. So, I am more or less, single. There might be that fear of discrimination, but it is not very evident here in the academic world although elsewhere it might be a problem. But I would say that a single woman should reach inward and have deep confidence in herself. She should do her work, serve God and move ahead with her life. If a man comes along, she can get married, if not, it is no reason to brood or become melancholy. If a woman has to depend on a man to get her identity, she would crash, because there is no guarantee as far as a man is concerned. You could fall in love with someone, get married and then for one reason, there is a separation or he dies, what happens? Such a woman would suddenly find herself all alone and if she didn’t have confidence in herself or had tied her identity to her husband, she would feel like a fish out of water.

What impact would you say the current change in gender roles has had on marriage?
This is one problem career women are facing, especially those of my generation. It may not be so with the younger generation because they have had we, the older ones, to live it out. The men have the mental image of their mothers being housewives, serving their fathers hand and foot and they expect you to do same even if you go to work like they do. I think it is sad and unfortunate because the women also go out in the morning, put in a good day’s work and work as hard as any man does and then when she gets home, the man is sitting in front of the television expecting her to have a meal ready.

I think it is not fair but where there is love and consideration on the part of the man, it shouldn’t be so. But the fact that women have to compete in the job market with men has affected marriages because it brings a lot of tension and bad feeling. And these negative feelings arise because men expect so much, just like their mothers use to deliver, yet they don’t pay all the bills like their fathers used to do.

How do you manage the home front?
I must say that I would wish to have more time to run the house, because apart from the academic work and pastoring, I am also a pastor at the bible school. Though, I have designed a working system and I have helps whom I give instructions and they carry it out.

How do you relax?
I have a voracious appetite as far as movies and music is concerned and it relaxes me. I get engrossed in any movie I’m seeing. I just live in the make-believe world of that movie. In the past when I had a lot of time, and I hope to go back to that when I’m through with bible school, I used to read a lot as relaxation. I also enjoy playing scrabble, but I’ve not had much time for that and it’s a pity.

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