Gender and Constitutional Representation: Legal Pathways to Women’s Political Participation in Nigeria

Women's political participation in Nigeria remains among the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa, with female representation in the National Assembly, state legislatures, and executive positions falling well below African Union and international parity benchmarks. The constitutional, electoral, and political party law frameworks that govern political participation contain significant structural barriers to women's meaningful inclusion. This doctoral research develops an original legal theory and reform framework for advancing women's constitutional representation in Nigeria, making a foundational scholarly contribution to feminist constitutional law, electoral law, and democratic theory. A multi-method feminist legal research methodology is employed, combining systematic doctrinal analysis of the 1999 Constitution, Electoral Act 2022, and INEC Gender Policy with empirical research involving 60 female politicians, electoral law practitioners, and gender rights advocates across five geopolitical zones. Intersectional analysis examines the compounding effects of ethnicity, religion, and class on women's political participation barriers. Comparative analysis examines gender representation legal mechanisms from Rwanda, South Africa, and Senegal. Secondary sources include feminist political theory, electoral law scholarship, and gender equality governance literature from 2019 to 2024. The research makes four original scholarly contributions: a legal mapping of structural barriers to women's political participation in Nigeria; a feminist constitutional theory of political representation applicable to Nigeria; an original constitutional amendment package establishing gender parity provisions; and an Electoral Law Reform Agenda incorporating affirmative action mechanisms that are constitutionally sustainable. Keywords: gender, constitutional representation, women's political participation, electoral law, Nigeria.