Does one normally associate a princess with a jungle?

No.

Princesses, on account of their status and gender, would be seen as diametrically opposed to the concept of the jungle.

A height of the celebration of the daintiness of a princess on account of her noble birth and delicate gender, is reached in the European folk tale told in his collection of fairy tales by Hans Christian Anderson, of the princess and the pea.

There was some doubt as to whether or not a particular lady was a princess.

A test was devised to settle all doubts.

A bed was made, composed of 20 mattresses and 20 featherbeds.

At the bottom, between the last two mattresses, a pea was placed.

The princess was to spend the night in the bed.

In the morning, she was asked how her night had been.

She replied that it had been terrible.

Something cruelly hard had been tormenting her through the mattresses.

Something small but most exasperating, which she could not see, but the sheer torment of which had made her entire body sore.

Her response established that she was a princess.

Only a princess could have such a delicate body as to feel a pea, and so intensely, through 40 layers of mattresses and featherbeds.

Clearly, such a person and the concept of the unhuman dangers represented by a forest are far apart.

In older texts and more evident in more recent Western literature, another concept of the princess emerged.

In the majority of the old stories, the princess was rescued by the knight, the noble and heroic soldier.

This rescue was often carried out by killing an evil personage who had made a captive of the princess.

In some cases, this personage would be a monster.

In the other perspective from the old stories and modern narratives, something strange emerged. 

The princess herself is depicted as the evil personage, at times disguised as a victim.

In such cases, the princess could not be killed but transformed to a normal person from whatever it was that had made her a monster.

This motif emerges in Andersen's marvellous fairy tale "The Traveling Companion" and the recent computer game The Witcher Part 1.

How does one navigate these two images of womanhood, in the form of the princess?

The female personality as delicate creature, extremely sensitive, and the female personality as a terrible monster, concealing destructive power under an unassuming and even beautiful exterior?

It can be argued that these two diametrically opposed images of female characters represent ways in which women have been seen by male society in different periods of particular cultures.

Yoruba culture has struggled to find a balance between these extremes, but I wonder to what degree the philosophical and spiritual possibilities of classical Yoruba conceptions of the feminine have been developed and how well they are understood in Yoruba society at the present time.

Indian, particularly Hindu culture, struck a balance through the strategic roles played by both male and female deities in its myths and the practices of the various branches of the religion, but the vision demonstrated by these forms is far in advance of the lived values of Hindu culture, as suggested by the Abused Goddesses campaign, which juxtaposes the veneration of female Goddesses and the denigration of women in India : 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/06/abused-goddesses-campaign-domestic-violence-india_n_3880515.html

Adeyinka Olarinmoye is one person who has been able to strike a balance. 

How does she demonstrate this balance?

"My father trained me" she says, "to be both feminine and powerful, in the right place, the right time, the right way".

Thus she can declare, in relation to the male dominated Nigerian political space, that women are perceived as "domestic 'animals' " who should not "be let loose among the hyenas and the big cats in the wild".

In a world, however, where jungle politics can even mean death while the state looks the other way, she has resolved that the right to seek any elective office is her right as a Nigerian citizen, regardless of gender, and has resolved to exercise that right through thick and thin.

How did she become like this?

A significant number of Nigerian men might like the idea of being a politician, but the very thought of Nigerian politics is something many could find frightening.

How does this woman do it?

How is she able to move between a largely sedentary, and mentalistic career as an academic at Lagos State University and elective politics?

How is she able to combine these two large roles with her roles as wife and mother?

Watching her comments online could give some guidance.

She has an inner fire.

She once stated on her Facebook status update that she can do better than the current President of Nigeria.

I take such statements seriously.

I take them seriously because the mental leap from where one is to where one could be is not always easy. 

Such a leap is the beginning of success.

I have also observed her witty combativeness and cerebrality in debate generally, including political debate.

She is also well informed, demonstrating a broad cultural range.

What is the source of that inner fire that makes the difference between the bold and the timid, the uncreatively conservative and the transformer, the self shaping person and the person shaped by circumstance without a reflexive relationship with this shaping process so as to at least contribute as much as possible to the crafting of their own person and life?

Is the "princess" in her name related to this?

Does it relate to her upbringing as a member of a royal family, so that culture of public service is something she is used to?

Is such a creative fire a culture among Nigerian princesses?

May we best describe the "princess" concept in relation to Adeyinka Olarinmoye in terms of the harmony of formative environment and personality, in which the flame of her upbringing fuses with an inner fire?

Or is it purely a personal attribute, deep rooted within and which must emerge in spite of any context?

Clearly this princess is able to combine the feminine exquisiteness of the princess in Andersen's fairy tale, while transforming into creative force the primal powers of the self, much feared but which can create great good when judiciously used. 

Image above:

Adeyinka Olarinmoye : Feminine elegance and professional power