On Friday, June 21, the story of a woman, who stabbed her husband in Kano State, was all over the social media.
The stabbed man, Saheed, who spoke on his hospital bed at the Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital where he is receiving treatment for the stab wounds, said he works in Zamfara but his wife lives in Kano. The two have just been married for six months.
Speaking honestly, Saheed said, his wife, Hana, never liked him but they both ended up in the marriage on the insistence of Hana’s mother, who wanted her to marry Saheed. Although the latter claimed to still love his wife, he stated that their love was one-sided from the outset but he was all the while hoping that his wife would develop some affection for as time went by.
On the contrary, however, Saheed said he was informed by neighbours that his wife regularly brought men to the house whenever he was away to work in Zamfara. To curb this, he said he changed two of his security personnel whom he believed were in connivance with his wife, seized all her phones and employed new security men. This obviously did not go down well with his wife, who stabbed him on his abdomen while he was sleeping, leading to serious internal bleeding.
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The injured wife, a Law graduate of Bayero University, who claimed she was pregnant, said her action was in self-defence and that her husband stabbed himself. She accused her husband of being violent on her.
Forced marriage, according to a marriage expert, Mrs. Comfort Adeniyi, is a marriage in which one or more of the parties is married without their consent or against their will. A forced marriage, she said is not the same as arranged marriage, in which both parties presumably consent to the assistance of their parents or a third party, such as a matchmaker, in finding and choosing a spouse. There is often a continuum of coercion used to compel a marriage, ranging from outright physical violence to subtle psychological pressure.
“Whether we like it or not, though it is now widely condemned by international opinion, forced marriages still take place in various cultures across the world, particularly in parts of South Asia and Africa. When a parent succeeded in cajoling a child into getting married to a person that he or she naturally does not want or bring home, he or she has been forced into the marriage. The truth here is many parents are guilty of this in Nigeria. They consciously do this most times because of money and the background of the person in question. The result is what we have today, happening in the homes of these youths,” observed Adeniyi.
Besides financial reason, Adeniyi also pointed out that parents, who force their children into marriages always believe that they are more experienced and objective than their children. They always think they know and see better than they. In some families, disobedience of this plan can end in bitterness so much that the child in question is disowned and even ostracised from the family. They also do this for religious reasons.
But the aftermath of picking or mandating a child to marry a particular person is not just enormous like the instance above, it can be very dangerous. According to Adeniyi, the thought of having one’s spouse picked out by parents can be repulsive to many of the young adults. They often view the opportunity to sow their own oats and experience the rush of first love as a fundamental rite of passage into adulthood.
“It is a process that should be born of free will, choice and should be the sole privilege and right of the individual, seeking a partner. Young adults feel cool and fulfilled when they are the ones, bringing in their partners to their parents. Psychologically and emotionally, it is a kind of achievement that gives them a great level of fulfillment in life,” she said.
“What parents should realise is that it is a confirmation of adulthood for children to be able to date and reach a point of marriage with the opposite sex. A child who is not able to reach that level will likely be spoon-fed by his or her parents for the rest of his life. This is why we parents must bring up our children up well in all ways so that they can make us proud,” noted the counselor.
When parents get involved greatly in the choice of their children’s life partner, Adeniyi said, they are made to live in fear and have resentment for their partners. This, unfortunately, denies them fulfillment in their marriages. It is what leads to infidelity, adultery and the series of domestic violence if you will take cognizance of the number of death-related violence in homes that the country is experiencing almost on a daily basis.
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“The joy of many young people is to be given the chance to find their perfect soul mate; the one who makes their heart flutter and their palms sweat. They want to experience intimacy on many levels with that person before they make the commitment to spend the rest of their lives with them. It is best that parents allow this and just guide them with wisdom,” she added.
But do parents know best?
Yes, psychologists say only that they need to allow their children grow to live their own lives without lording their own views and interests on them.
To establish this fact more is the first United Nations Human Rights Council resolution against child, which affirms that forced marriages cause violations of human rights.
“It prevents individuals from living their lives free from all forms of violence and that has adverse consequences on the enjoyment of human rights, such as the right to education, [and] the right to the highest attainable standard of health, including sexual and reproductive health,” the resolution said.
It again states that “the elimination of child, early and forced marriage should be considered, as priority in its further discussions for a better society come 2023.”