I promised to share my perspective on paternity fraud and other issues this week.  I want to start with the various types of marriages prevalent in Nigeria and the implications.

Traditional marriage: In Africa, we do traditional marriages. The man pays a bride price and the couple get parental consent and blessings. Some Christian denominations will not conduct your church wedding without you first of all doing your traditional marriage. Parental consent and blessings are that important. Thereafter, the couple are regarded as married according to tradition.

After then, traditionalists do not need any other marriage ceremony. In traditional marriages, the Urhobos and Isokos, to be specific, the wife makes a vow to be faithful to her husband. But the husband does not make this vow. This is because both ethnic groups recognise and practice polygamy. It means the husband is at liberty to marry more wives. Women, who did only traditional marriage, can’t, therefore, accuse their husbands of committing adultery because a side chick today can become a wife tomorrow. 

Usually, courtship comes before marriage. Courtship is that period when the people involved get to know each other better to enable them to decide whether or not to go ahead with the marriage. Traditionally and in Christianity, courtship did not include premarital sex in the curriculum of courtship. We added sex as part of “knowing one another better.” 

Islamic Marriage (Nikkah): Any woman married by Islamic rites must recognise that the religion allows her husband to marry up to four wives, if he so wishes: Side chick today, wife number two tomorrow. I am not versed in Islam, but I don’t know the basis for a wife to accuse her husband of infidelity.  

Civil Marriage: It legally formalises the union and goes with some concomitant legal obligations. 

The couple exchange vows of mutual fidelity. There is no room for polygamy because you can be charged to court for bigamy (Marrying a second person while still legally married to your spouse).

Church marriage: This is conducted in a church and is often covenantal. It involves the exchange of vows, including mutual fidelity. In some orthodox churches, you can’t be a communicant unless your marriage is solemnised in the church. The church recognises civil and traditional marriages, but you must be married in the church before you can become a communicant. Having identified the various types of marriages in our clime, let’s delve into the issues raised last week. 

Infidelity: I am reluctant to discuss infidelity because the Urhobo/ Isoko roots in me predominate my opinion. In the past, infidelity was something that was scarcely heard of in Urhobo land, nor published in the streets of Isoko land.  A Christian leader once told me to accompany him to settle a case of infidelity. I declined. I told him that “I don’t use my teeth to share a piece of meat that I will not eat.  To the glory of God, they reconciled and are still together. As a Christian, I believe in forgiveness, but spouses should respect boundaries and avoid crossing the Rubicon. Don’t do what will make it very difficult for your spouse to forgive you or for him/her to live with life-long scars. 

My firm Christian beliefs, notwithstanding,  erivwin (punishment for those who do things the society considers to be taboos) is real in Urhobo and Isoko. It was deadlier in the pre-Christian days. A married woman must report a case of another man holding her hand in a suggestive way or touching her buttocks or any trespass. Erivwin caught up with housewives who failed to tell their husbands. For those who told their husbands, the trespassers were fined a goat to appease the gods and the ancestors.

For those who didn’t report, their children died first, then the women followed. We are not even talking of the real adultery yet. Someone I know at close range lost his two children. When it became obvious to the wife that she was next, she confessed. They are “Christians,” but I guess the glory of God departed from her, which exposed her to the wrath of the gods and ancestors. Unfortunately, the “Christian brother” who committed the act with her was spared. But men don’t escape all the time. 

Yes, Christianity has watered down the potency of erivwin, but if you are an Urhobo/Isoko woman, it’s safer for you to stay away from adultery. Two Urhobo women were consumed by erivwin due to adultery in the last two years. They were “Christians.” Some of these things are mysterious to me, but many Urhobo and Isoko people know erivwin is real. Leave Christianity, Islam or whatever religion you subscribe to out of it. 

The point is, if a married man did only traditional marriage, or Nikkai, you can’t accuse him of having side chicks or having children outside marriage. The women can easily become wives and the children, your step-children. But if after your traditional, a man voluntarily decides to do civil or church marriage and exchange vows of mutual fidelity. Any sex outside marriage by either party is adultery. There is no African man in the matter. Vows are meant to be kept. Nobody forced you to take them. If you want to be African man, stop at traditional marriage. 

Paternity Fraud: Infidelity results in passing on other men’s children to your husband as his. None of the four types of marriages allows adultery by wives, so deceptively passing on other men’s children as your husband’s cannot be justified. For me, that is a total No-No. It’s not just the infidelity, but the deceit and wickedness. This is totally different from a man who fathered children outside civil or church marriage. I have no problem with raising other people’s children or adoption. These are based on truth, not falsehood. 

IVF and swapping of children: Owners of clinics that swap babies or use sperms other than the husband’s to fertilise the wife without the husband’s knowledge should be sued. That is ethical and professional misconduct. If a man is infertile and agrees to use donated sperm, that’s his business. I withhold my personal opinion on IVF. It’s their personal decision. But a man who is infertile must disclose his health condition to his spouse-to-be before marriage. If he hides it and the spouse finds out after marriage, that marriage is null and void because it was based on deceit. 

Consummation of marriage: An infertile man or woman can marry because they have the capacity to consummate the marriage, that is, the man will insert his penis into his wife’s vagina and have sex before the marriage will become valid. What is important is full disclosure of health condition before marriage. The primary purpose of marriage remains companionship, not having children.

Impotence: A man who is impotent cannot go into a marriage. For any marriage to be valid, it must be consummated,  A flaccid penis cannot penetrate the vagina and have sex. So the marriage is null and void ab initio because it’s not consummated. Couples who engage in such deceits are not husbands and wives but companions.

These are my thoughts from and my reaction to my article last Saturday.