Breaking the blue ceiling: Stella Okuyiga’s eyewitness account of Nigeria’s first policewomen, By Godwin Onyeacholem

As a memoir, it presents the remarkable life of a woman who joined the police as a young recruit and retired more than 30 years later as a deputy commissioner… As an inspirational work, it speaks to young women considering careers in policing and public service. It reminds them that institutions become stronger when opportunity is determined by ability and commitment rather than gender.

For much of Nigeria’s early policing history, the uniform was considered the exclusive preserve of men. Women could be policed, questioned or protected, but they were not permitted to serve as police officers.

That began to change in the 1940s and 1950s, when prominent women’s rights campaigners — including Oyinkansola Abayomi, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, Margaret Ekpo and Elizabeth Adekogbe — intensified demands for women’s participation in public institutions and national decision-making.

Through petitions, protests and political advocacy, these women confronted a colonial establishment that regarded policing as unsuitable for women. Their campaign was part of the broader struggle for political representation, equality and recognition of women as full participants in Nigeria’s public life.

In 1954, Margaret Ekpo, then a member of the Eastern House of Assembly, reportedly took the argument directly to the floor of the legislature. She made the case that women should be recruited into the police, contending, among other things, that they would be less susceptible to the culture of bribery for which some policemen of the period had become notorious.

By the following year, the colonial authorities had yielded to the sustained pressure. Newspaper advertisements invited qualified women to apply to join the Nigeria Police Force.

Among those who responded was Stella Opuiyo, a fearless and adventurous 25-year-old woman from Okrika, the ancient Ijaw kingdom in present-day Rivers State. She would later become Stella Okuyiga after marriage.

In October 1955, she joined 19 other women at the Southern Police College, now the Police College, Ikeja, for six months of training. Together, they became the first women formally recruited into the Nigeria Police Force.

Their arrival came almost a century after the establishment of formal policing in Nigeria in 1861 and 25 years after the northern and southern regional police formations were merged to create a unified Nigeria Police Force in 1930.

Now 96, retired Deputy Commissioner of Police Stella Okuyiga has documented that historic journey in Origin of Policewomen in Nigeria and My Journey in the Nigeria Police Force (1955–1986).

The book is more than a personal memoir. It is an eyewitness account of a decisive turning point in the history of policing, gender equality and public service in Nigeria.

A Pioneer Writes History

From her first encounter with the parade ground as a recruit, Okuyiga understood that she was participating in something larger than herself. She was entering an institution in which women had no established path, no body of accumulated experience and few guarantees that they would be accepted as equals.

That awareness stayed with her throughout a distinguished career spanning slightly more than three decades. By the time she retired in 1986 at the age of 56, she had attained the rank of deputy commissioner of police — an extraordinary achievement for a member of the pioneering class of policewomen.

 She was also the first woman from the old Rivers State to join the Nigeria Police Force.

Her book reflects a longstanding determination to preserve the experiences of the women who entered the institution when female officers were still viewed as an experiment. With the precision of a police officer and the emotional honesty of a pioneer, she recounts their recruitment, training, early assignments and gradual acceptance within the Force.

For decades, much of the story of Nigeria’s first policewomen survived through fragments: fading official files, old photographs and occasional recollections in police barracks and offices. Okuyiga has now assembled those fragments into an institutional record told by someone who stood at the centre of the events.

“I was there, and I witnessed everything firsthand,” she says.

That statement captures the book’s greatest strength. Okuyiga does not approach the subject as a distant historian reconstructing events from secondary accounts. She writes as an active participant whose life was shaped by the policies, prejudices and possibilities of the period.

Drawing on official documents, personal diaries and lived experience, she situates the recruitment of women within Nigeria’s wider social and political development. She examines the resistance the pioneers encountered, the policies that defined their duties, and the gradual changes that enabled women to assume broader responsibilities in the Force.

History Preserved Against Loss

The importance of Okuyiga’s account becomes even clearer when viewed against the vulnerability of Nigeria’s historical records.

Some of the materials she painstakingly preserved were lost during the Nigerian Civil War between 1967 and 1970. As the conflict intensified in the Eastern Region, she attempted to move her belongings to Port Harcourt. In the process, valuable records and photographs disappeared.

Among the lost items was a treasured photograph of the 20 pioneer policewomen standing proudly in their khaki uniforms during training.

“The loss of those materials remains one of my greatest regrets,” she writes.

That regret gives the book a deeper sense of urgency. It demonstrates how easily personal and institutional memory can vanish when records are not properly preserved. By documenting what she remembers and combining those memories with surviving records, Okuyiga has rescued an important part of Nigeria’s history from possible erasure.

The book also captures the human side of institutional change. It does not merely catalogue policies and dates; it reveals what it meant to be a woman in uniform at a time when the idea itself was unfamiliar to society.

Okuyiga recounts moments of prejudice, uncertainty and unequal treatment. But she also records the friendships, mentorship and professional triumphs that affirmed the place of women in policing. Her story shows that institutional progress rarely arrives fully formed. It is built gradually by people willing to enter spaces in which their presence is doubted and their abilities constantly tested.

From 20 Pioneers to Nearly 50,000 Officers

The scale of the transformation is remarkable. What began in 1955 as a restricted unit of 20 women in khaki skirts has grown into a fully integrated female police population estimated at close to 50,000 officers — about 15 per cent of the Nigeria Police Force.

Women now serve across police stations, state commands, specialist departments, intelligence formations and operational units. They investigate crimes, command formations, manage public order, participate in peacekeeping operations, and contribute to virtually every area of contemporary policing.

That progress makes Okuyiga’s book both timely and necessary. It reminds readers that today’s opportunities were created by women who entered the Force when there were no precedents to follow.

Inspector-General of Police Olatunji Disu recognised this broader significance when he encountered the manuscript. He concluded that its importance extended beyond Okuyiga’s personal story and embraced the publication as a police project.

In his introduction, the Inspector-General observes that the story belongs not only to Okuyiga, but to every woman who wore the uniform when opportunities were limited and expectations were low. It also belongs to those who challenged stereotypes and to the male officers and institutional leaders who supported the inclusion and advancement of women.

“The journey began with 20 women in khaki skirts,” he notes. “It continues today in every police station, command headquarters, and operational unit where Nigerian women serve with honour.”

Tribute, Testimony and Institutional Archive

As a work of history, Origin of Policewomen in Nigeria and My Journey in the Nigeria Police Force (1955–1986), published by the African Centre for Media and Information Literacy (AFRICMIL), fills a significant gap in the literature on policing and gender in Nigeria. It offers researchers, historians, police officers, and students of public institutions a rare first-person account of how women entered one of the country’s most important security institutions.

As a memoir, it presents the remarkable life of a woman who joined the police as a young recruit and retired more than 30 years later as a deputy commissioner.

As an inspirational work, it speaks to young women considering careers in policing and public service. It reminds them that institutions become stronger when opportunity is determined by ability and commitment rather than gender.

Most importantly, the book restores names, experiences and sacrifices that could easily have disappeared from public memory. The history of women in the Nigeria Police Force is not an incidental chapter in the story of the institution. It is part of the wider history of Nigerian women’s struggle for recognition, representation and equality.

Seventy years after 20 young women first marched onto the training grounds of the Southern Police College, Okuyiga has ensured that their courage will not be forgotten.

She has put pen to history and given the country both a tribute and a testimony: a tribute to the women who broke the blue ceiling, and a testimony from one of the pioneers who was there when it first began.

Godwin Onyeacholem works at the African Centre for Media and Information Literacy (AFRICMIL).