By Helen Ovbiagele

An elderly ‘auntie’  was wringing her hands in anguish when she read in the papers that the Senate had passed the bill against same sex marriage. “Have our moral values degenerated to such depth that we have to pass a law on that?  Are they saying that such a thing goes on in Nigeria?”

“Mum, a member of the House wouldn’t sponsor such a bill, if it wasn’t a reality in our lives,” replied her son.  “Surely, mum, you’ve heard of the gay movement abroad.  You worked there as a social worker.”

“Yes, yes, but even there, during our time, it was a clandestine affair, and those who practised it did so in hiding.  No-one wanted such stigma.  I know they’ve shed that attitude there now, but this is a matter that doesn’t concern here us at all.  Our culture is so much different from that of  the oyinbos.”

“Well, it doesn’t seem so now.  This is part of the civilization package that we have imported from there. ”
“Hm!  Heaven help us.  Anyway, the end of the world is near.  Jesus will soon return.  Halleluiah!  Er, Helen, you seem indifferent about this awful news.  Don’t you have a view on it?”

“Auntie, I don’t think we should worry about it. It just wouldn’t fit into our culture, tradition and way of life.  It will continue to be the very private part of the lives of those who have a penchant for it.  It won’t take such a firm root here that you will actually have families holding gay weddings.

“Our rulers   should address the more pressing issues in the nation e.g. terrorism, high cost of living, better and affordable healthcare system, security of lives and property, etc.  Sex preference is the least of our problems, if indeed it should be.”

People may not agree with me, but I don’t think attention should be diverted from the more important issues confronting our welfare, and begin to dwell on people’s choice for intimacy. Personally, I can’t see acceptance of gay relationship/marriage consuming our passion in this country; considering our way of life.

One,  unlike the western world where a human being may be all alone in the world, with no link with or knowledge of any family member, the average Nigerian believes very much in family.  It is the bedrock of our lives.  The ardent desire of anyone here is that our marital partner would be acceptable to our parents and members of our family.  If you’re in a gay relationship, would you have the courage to take that person home to your parents to introduce to them as the person you’re dating?  Would you as a man say to your parents, ‘Mum, dad, meet Cyril.  We’re dating and are hoping to tie the knot at a point.’

My guess is that mum would collapse in a heap and dad would cry ‘abomination!’, and chase you both out with a broom or a stick.  If neighbours or relatives on the premises get to know, they might lock the gates and beat both of you up in an attempt to purge out what they deem ‘undesirable’ habit in you.

If you get past all that, and your parents are ‘with it’ enough to accept that aspect of your life, you may have to tell them which of you is the ‘male’ and who is ‘female’.  In this country, we love having children, with a passion.  We don’t feel complete without them in our lives, whether or not we can be caring and responsible parents.  We just want children to show the world that we’re complete human beings.

Parents of  a couple in a gay marriage would want to know where the grand children they expect from you will come from.  Adoption is slowly gaining acceptance here, but many families wouldn’t want children adopted into the family as their heirs.  You may want to do what Elton John and David Furnish his partner did, and get a woman to act as a surrogate mother for your children.

That is, if you have their type of money.  What about the wedding?  What role would parents play?  They will have to be told who to give out as female to the other partner. I don’t know how prepared our marriage registries and religious organizations are for this.  I fear for when the male/male or female/female couple would come out to pose for their wedding photos.  We have restive youths!

Many families consider the traditional wedding to be the real wedding, and many prefer to hold it in their hometowns or villages.  Would the elders allow such a ceremony in their village?  Won’t the youths waylay the couple at the entrance to the village?

Two, if a gay couple is able to scale over all these ‘little’ obstacles, how would the home-front be?  In our culture, there’s a head of the home.  How do you decide this, and how do you cope with relationship with members of the extended families?  We’ve just been told formally that polygamy is not a crime in this country.  What happens when the ‘man’ in a same sex relationship wants to take other wives, who  of course would be male?  Would this be plain-sailing, or would there be blows to settle the matter?

Remember that the other partner is not female, and therefore cannot be beaten physically into submission.  He may actually be stronger physically than the ‘husband’.  Anyone who comes to intervene in a fight in their home does so at his own risk.  The person might as well go intervene in  a  fight in a motor park.  Okay, if  there’s peace and harmony between the man and his ‘wives’, how about social outings?

That’s very much a part of our lives.  Will a roster be drawn up on who goes out with him, and when/where,  or will he go out with all of them in tow?  That would be an interesting sight – be it an all male or all female polygamous marriage.
Three, a sure thing in life is that all living beings will check out at some point.  That’s how God has made it.

In a country where widows are humiliated, tortured and stripped of  their rights and belongings, how will families of  a deceased gay man conduct widowhood rites on his male wife/wives?  Will the latter meekly accept to go sit on the floor, have their hair shaved, swear on the corpse of their husband that they didn’t kill him with juju, go weep round his grave, etc.?  I can’t see any man submitting himself to any widowhood rites.  Would anyone dare ask him to?  Neither can anyone come deprive him of  the ‘husband’s’ property.  In short, any confrontation would be settled with fists, and violence met with violence.

Frankly, in my opinion, I don’t think, in our every day life,  we should lose any sleep over gay relationship/marriage, since, in truth, sex preference is a very private and personal thing, and people may well indulge in it without the knowledge of the outside world.  Our faith will not allow it to stand solidly. For Christians, both the Old and New Testaments are very clear on the issue.  Other faiths have their own stand too, even the traditional worshipers.   In the United States, it’s only about six States or so, that have made it legal yet.

It was good for our Senate to take a firm stand, but I would be a lot happier if our law-makers legislate on issues that will actually uplift our standard of  living in this country.  Who cares about who gets married to whom?  I don’t.   But I do care about jobs for our children; about affordable housing and healthcare; about qualitative education; about a clean environment; about security of lives and property; about a government who is people-friendly.