Tanimowo Ogunlesi who was born in 1908 and died in 2002 was a Nigerian

women's rights Women's rights are the rights and Entitlement (fair division), entitlements claimed for women and girls worldwide. They formed the basis for the women's rights movement in the 19th century and the feminist movements during the 20th and 21st c ...

activist and the leader of the Women's Improvement League. She was one of the leading women activists of her era and co-founded the

National Council of Women's Societies National Council of Women's Societies, also known by its acronym NCWS, is a Nigerian non-governmental and non-partisan women's organization composed of a network of independent women organizations in Nigeria binding together to use NCWS' platform ...

, the country's leading women's rights

organization An organization or organisation (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), see spelling differences) is an legal entity, entity—such as ...

Life

Tanimowo Ogunlesi was born on 1 December 1908. She attended Kudeti Girls School Ibadan, Oyo State, and attended United Missionary College (UMC) for her teacher's training qualifications. She started teaching in Lagos at CMS Girls’ Seminary School in 1934. She married J.S. Ogunlesi, who was also a teacher, in 1934. Her husband received a scholarship to study in London, which gave her opportunities to relocate to London too. She then continued her education at the nursery school in St. Andrew’s University in Scotland, in 1946. Tanimowo and her husband returned back to Nigeria in 1947, after her husband was appointed as the Adult Education Officer of the Western Region. She was the first person to establish an elementary boarding school in Ibadan (Children Home School) in 1948. She became the first president of the National Council of Women's Societies in 1959. She dealt largely on the rights of women to vote and to have access to

education Education is the transmission of knowledge and skills and the development of character traits. Formal education occurs within a structured institutional framework, such as public schools, following a curriculum. Non-formal education als ...

al facilities but like most

women A woman is an adult female human. Before adulthood, a female child or adolescent is referred to as a girl. Typically, women are of the female sex and inherit a pair of X chromosomes, one from each parent, and women with functional u ...

nationalists of the era, she never really questioned the male dominance of the Nigerian household. She was part of a movement to increase domestic science training in Nigeria when she opened a home training school.

References

Nigerian women's rights activists Nigerian women in politics Nigerian women activists Nigerian suffragists History of women in Nigeria 20th-century Nigerian women Founders of Nigerian schools and colleges Nigerian women educators St Anne's School, Ibadan alumni 1908 births 2002 deaths People from colonial Nigeria {{Nigeria-activist-stub