Veteran Nollywood actress, Kate Henshaw, has delivered a scathing critique of the status and treatment of women in Nigeria, calling out societal, religious, and legal systems that she said continued to discriminate against women.

In an interview on Arise News Channel on Saturday, Kate Henshaw lamented what she described as the pervasive dehumanisation of Nigerian women, accusing men and institutions of twisting the Biblical message of equality between man and woman into one of hierarchy and oppression.

“God created man and woman. He created the man first, no doubt,” Henshaw said. “Even pastors and churches are at fault for this. He (God) brought the woman from the side, not from the head to be over the man, or from under to be beneath him, but beside, to reign beside him, to be fruitful, multiply and bring up children and grow together.”

However, she argued that this ideal of partnership has been warped. “Nigerian men see women as less than human,” she said. “That is why when you leave these shores and go somewhere else, they show you people pepper.”

The award-winning actress highlighted structural discrimination embedded within Nigeria’s legal framework. She pointed to sections of the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act, which, she claimed, legitimises gender-based violence. “Even our laws… favour the man,” Henshaw said. “A man is reasonably allowed to chastise his wife. Why?”

She also criticised the gender disparity in citizenship laws, noting that while Nigerian men can easily obtain citizenship or passports for their foreign wives, Nigerian women married to foreigners face far more bureaucratic hurdles.

“A man who marries a foreigner can get a passport for her,” she said. “But a woman who marries a foreigner would go through loops before she can give the same passport to her husband, who is a foreigner in this same Nigeria. So what are we talking about?” Kate Henshaw queried.