She did not wait to be chosen. She ran. On the seat you claim versus the seat you are handed.
There is an argument going on this last week, in WhatsApp groups and across LinkedIn, and it is the wrong argument.
When the news broke that Oyinkansola Badejo-Okusanya, Senior Advocate of Nigeria, had become President of the Nigerian Bar Association, the headlines called her the first female president. And immediately the correction came. She is not the first, people insisted. She is the second. Dame Priscilla Kuye led the NBA back in 1991. Please do your research. Please read to understand.
Both sides are technically right, and both are missing the point. Because the word that actually matters is not first or second. It is elected.
Dame Kuye was indeed the first woman to hold the office, and she deserves every honour for it. But she did not arrive there by the ballot. She was First Vice President when the sitting president left to become Attorney-General of the Federation, and she stepped up, by succession, to fill the vacant seat. She was handed the office by circumstance, and she carried it with real distinction.
